


Not For The Fact

by Persephone



Series: Willing to Take the Risk [3]
Category: Valentine's Day (2010)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Bradley Cooper - Freeform, Canon Gay Character, Canon Gay Relationship, Domestic, Eric Dane - Freeform, Explicit Sexual Content, Los Angeles, M/M, Rare Characters, Rare Fandoms, Rare Pairing, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-09
Updated: 2012-02-28
Packaged: 2017-10-27 03:01:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 28,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/290927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Persephone/pseuds/Persephone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The journey of a thousand miles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He was lying on his stomach, arms folded under his head, feeling completely satiated.

It was an extraordinary sensation considering that he was pulsing with an erection that wouldn’t quit and was soaking a growing wet-spot into the pillow beneath his hips. But there was a perfectly good explanation for it. 

Sean was seated on his ass, naked just like him, and giving him a massage.

Sean had never given him a massage. And whatever Sean was doing back there with his big, strong hands, slicking his oiled fingers into his muscles and knowing just how to dig when he got a dying, moaning response, was making his body irreconcilable. Orgasm, and or, erection? How about both?

He hadn’t been in to work since he had returned from his panicked flight after Sean’s proposal, and he didn’t think he would be going into to the office any time soon. 

They were ensconced in Sean’s bedroom at the moment, the room lit only by glowing candles, and Sean was telling him stories of locker room life, which Sean assured him weren’t the scenes of circle jerks and hot guys rubbing come into each other's pecs that he envisioned. Sean was explaining that the place was full of professional tensions and salary disputes, fight after fight from personal feuds, and endless rounds of perpetual bitchiness.

He liked his version better.

Sean was kneading along his shoulders, from his upper arms down towards his elbows, making him shudder each time close to an orgasm. Sean’s hands were covered in some kind of oil he presumed was used to make sex slaves out of perfectly unsuspecting boys, and he could only brace himself when the hard, rough hand traced a groove down his spine, slid across his waist, and slipped under his hip to press itself between his cock and the cushion. 

He buried his face into the pillow and wailed to his heart’s content as Sean’s fingers rubbed his tip, squeezed it hard. He raised his head, gasping, and Sean pulled back, knowing he was about to come.

The focus shifted instead to the warm and heavy cock pressing between his cheeks as Sean pushed gently against his ass, his wet, warm head leaving a cooling trail against his skin. It was torture of the best kind, and Sean had promised him a happy ending.

Then in a haze he realized that Sean was telling him something about the ocean view, visible through his glass walls, which were also letting in the soft pounding sounds of the surf. Sean was whispering about how going outside on a moonlit night like this almost guaranteed a sighting of seals moon-bathing on the shore. 

It eventually began sinking into his addled brain that Sean was suggesting they go out there.

Stretching lazily, then settling back into his massage, he informed Sean that he had no interested in sand or water, and that he couldn’t care less about baby seals.

“I like dinner parties and concierge,” he explained to Sean, “and quarterbacks with big hands and even bigger dicks.”

Sean then sat back and laughed for a long time, which _he_ thought was funny because he was being perfectly serious. 

He wriggled his shoulders to make Sean get back to the massage, and sighed with pure happiness when Sean instead bent all the way over and lightly kissed him on the lips. 

He turned his head, giving Sean more of his tongue, and let out a sigh as Sean finally moved his hips, sliding his cock between his cheeks until it came to rest at just the right spot. He spread his legs as Sean’s warm fingers gently parted him, sinking into him over and over until they were both groaning with the exquisite pleasure. And then a big, hot tip at last nudged against his entrance. This was going to be _so good._ Sean flicked at him with his tongue, then licked his upper, then his lower lip. Then he began to bite him across his cheek, down his neck.

He was losing it, on the verge of climaxing, begging Sean to stop teasing him. 

Sean finally spread his thighs over his hips, sank his fingers into his hips and held him.

He groaned long and hard as Sean slid in deep inside him, pressing and holding him as his body trembled with the intensity of it. Words that seemed to come from someone else, somewhere deep inside him, slid out of him, pouring uncensored from his lips, and he was rewarded with deep groans as Sean pulled out of him, ever so slowly, and then let loose on him. 

He pushed back on his elbows, making Sean make those wild noises that made him catch his breath, his tender, perfectly manipulated muscles practically singing with mouthwatering pleasure.

If this was what committed life was all about, then sign him up.

~*~

The sun was burning up the patio umbrella he had almost impaled himself with setting up, but they were safely protected under it, wrapped around each other on a chaise.

It was as hot and as lazy a Malibu afternoon as it got.

In the viciously bright afternoon sky, a helicopter was circling above them on the beach. They were on Sean's balcony and not on the beach itself, but he presumed it was permissible hours for it to be up there making that godawful noise. From the way it was swooping, the chopper crew were apparently trying to see if Sean was outside, and with anyone. However from where they were camped out, it would be difficult to get an angle on them.

He could have told them to save their fuel. He had every intention of going out with Sean for breakfast, lunch, or dinner as soon as they actually felt like staying vertical for more than the length of time it took to take a shower together. The paparazzi could feel free to take their pictures and videos then.

The chopper moved off into the horizon and he looked down at Sean. Sean was still passed out, his face buried against his neck. Afternoons had fast become nap times for both of them. 

He looked down at Sean's peacefully sleeping face. His soft blue eyes were closed now, but he had come to like waking up in the morning and looking at the happy, contended way in which they smiled at him. He planned to go in to work any day now, just as soon as it no longer felt as though he would be leaving a strip of himself here when he left.

Somehow he had done or said all the right things at all the crucial moments and he had found himself on the right side of the line with Sean. And he wanted so badly to get it right. 

For the first time in their relationship he didn't feel pressured or defensive about the way he was handling things. Whatever else he did from here on out, he was going to keep working on doing things right. 

Sean stirred and sighed softly, and then was reaching up to turn his jaw toward him. Unable to withstand, he smiled as Sean licked the corner of his lips as if he tasted something good there, tasting it again before covering his mouth with his. 

His cock throbbed. He wouldn’t have believed he had these many orgasms in him.

“I had the most awesome dream,” Sean said hoarsely. 

“You might still be having it.”

“Do me a favor and make sure it doesn't end?”

He laughed and promised that he would.

Sean snuggled deeper into his side, his eyes still blissfully closed. “You gotta go to work tomorrow?”

“Not yet,” he said softly.

“Good.”

~*~

Sean was staring at him in surprise, while he glued himself even harder to the side of the boat and kept a wide smile on his face.

Sean wasn’t paying any attention to the smile. He didn't blame him.

It was a little hard to accept it when he was plastered against the cabin window—it was called a port or something—his hands twisted and locked around the rail behind him. He wanted to present a more together impression, but he didn't seem to have a choice; there seemed to be no connection between his intellect and his hands, which wouldn't let go of the rail.

“But _you_ suggested a boat ride,” Sean was saying in confusion.

“Yes, because I know you've been wanting to be out on the water for a while now. It's okay,” he said lightly, indicating with his head. “Just come over here.”

Sean didn't move, still holding the mooring rope limply at his side.

“But why would you suggest a boat trip if you're afraid of water? And who's afraid of water?”

“I'm not afraid of water,” he replied, maintaining a light tone. “I'm afraid of _the_ water. Now c'mere, will ya.”

Sean, at last, dropped the ropes and strode across the deck of the small yacht. At least Sean had picked a decent sized one. At least it wasn't one of those tiny sailboats that bobbed along the water like a tiny paper boat. 

He closed his eyes and swallowed. Not the best line of thought at the moment.

He sighed when he felt Sean finally reach him, pressing his body into him and wrapping his arms around him. Sean reached for the railing behind him, clamping his hands over his sure-to-be white knuckles and making him gasp quietly with relief.

He opened his eyes and smiled up at Sean. “See? All good.”

“Holden, what are you doing?” Sean frowned down at him. “You're not looking for a reason to call off the engagement, are you?”

He gave Sean a patient smile. “Don't be cheeky. I'm just trying to do what's right.”

“And what's that?”

“I know you like doing outdoorsy stuff, so I'm going to try and like outdoorsy stuff as well.” He smiled wider and played his trump card. “I'm _committing._ ”

Sean's mouth pulled in confusion, his frown melting in slow, not entirely convinced degrees. He brought a hand from behind them and brushed his knuckles against his cheek.

“I'm touched, sweetheart,” he said gently. “But you don't have to drown trying.”

“I'm going to drown?”

Sean sighed, pulling back. “Come on, let’s get you inside.”

He pried his hand from the rail and gripped the front of Sean’s jeans. Then his eyes flew to the pier, which seemed to be drifting away.

“Sean, the boat's moving,” he said hurriedly.

Sean let out a heavy sigh.

“Oh, right,” he said, laughing. “What was I thinking. You probably set the— What is it, the sail and rudder, right?”

Sean kept moving backwards without responding, walking him, his hands still clutching his jeans, toward the back of the boat where the entrance to the cabin was.

~*~

The yacht moved at a slow and gentle pace toward the horizon.

He was even more thankful now that Sean had rented a big enough boat so that he didn't have to feel as if he was right on the water even when he wasn't on that horrible thing called a deck. He looked about the cabin. It had a sitting area at the bottom of the stairs, and a kitchen, a bathroom and bedroom towards the back. 

He could hear Sean up top, setting up some kind of cuddling area at the back of the boat. At first he had feared that Sean would suggest they cozy up at the front part of the boat, the bow—the part looking like it was free-floating on the water—when he had seen Sean look longingly at it.

It definitely was the logical place if they had wanted to see the full effect of the sunset and all that. But he didn't know whether even Sean standing naked there would have made him go over there. The back at least had some kind of an enclosed feeling to it.

“How are you feeling down there?” Sean called.

“Weird.”

“Not nauseous or anything, right?”

“No, just weird.”

The sound of thudding feet floated down as Sean suddenly descended the stairs. Sean came to a halt at the bottom of the stairs and looked carefully at him.

“You okay?”

He kept his arms around his knees, his back against the cabin wall, and had a ready smile on his face. “Yup.”

“Then your palace awaits.”

Sean came over and offered his hand, which he carefully stretched out his arm and took, gripping Sean's fingers. They slowly made their way back to the stairs, his feet and toes feeling each rock and tilt of the boat as if by a special ability.

“You really never went out on boats as a kid?” Sean remarked, still sounding amazed by the whole thing.

“I did, twice. I peed myself the second time. I was nine, but still. Worst weekend of my life.”

Sean chuckled, staying close to him as they went up the stairs. 

As soon as he hit the deck, warm Pacific breezes wafted over him and he closed his eyes, inhaling deeply as it ruffled his hair. 

He opened his eyes and smiled at Sean. “That was nice.”

“It's all going to be nice from here on out,” Sean said, moving him slowly into the space he had made up. 

It was filled with blankets and cushions, and an open cooler containing champagne and cans of beer sat next to the inviting setup. He turned and looked suspiciously at Sean. 

“You want to confuse me into liking this whole being on the water thing, don't you?”

“The thought had crossed my mind.” 

He slowly lowered himself to the cushions and made room for Sean between his legs. Sean came down to him, resting his back against his chest. He wrapped his arms around Sean’s wide body, closing his eyes and pressing soft kisses into his scalp.

“It's nice out here,” he said, then looked out across the water at the darkness that started from the edge of the boat.

It went out into to the horizon, and up into the sky. Starlight came back down to the ocean, meeting at the faraway lights that framed the Malibu coastline. 

“I guess at night it's not so bad,” he said softly.

“Glad to hear it.”

He kissed Sean behind his ear. “Or maybe it's because I'm with my man of steel.” 

Sean went very still. He thought he could actually feel Sean's heart bumping against his arm. He could all but see the heat rising up his face. “You like that, don't you?” he teased.

“I think I love it.”

He breathed and pressed his face into Sean's hair. 

“Think anybody'll miss us if we stay out here?”

“Paula might.”

“Oh, yeah. I'd almost forgotten. The real world,” he said blandly. “When does it go away.”

“Whenever we want it to,” Sean said quietly. “It's our world, we make the rules.”

He was silent, thinking about that. “I could live with that,” he said.

~*~

“The most difficult thing you ever put me through?” 

Sean went silent. Then he said slowly, seriously. “That's an odd question to ask.”

“But I want to know. In all the years that we were going out, what did I do that hurt you the most?”

Sean remained silent. 

He tightened his arms around Sean’s body and gently kissed his temple. “Tell me. Please?”

And even then, for a while longer, all he heard was the sound of water against the boat.

He knew he couldn't blame Sean. For three years he hadn't wanted to know anything about them. They were either good, and therefore together, or they were not and broken up. Sean was only reacting in a way that anyone would expect, wanting to protect himself. He could practically hear him arguing internally.

“Well,” Sean finally said, slowly. “I guess it would have to be you being with other guys whenever we were broken up.”

He frowned, surprised. “You're kidding, right?”

“Why would I kid about that?”

“Because you must have gone with other guys when we weren't together. Right?”

“Nope.”

“Aw, come on.”

But Sean was only silent.

He leaned to one side so he could see Sean's face. “You're telling me that in the three years we were breaking up and getting back together, you never got with other guys?”

“Not once.” 

He stared at Sean. Sean was looking at their feet. He searched Sean's face, trying to understand how he could have missed something so vital.

“You don't believe me.”

He sat back on the cushions and put his arms back around Sean. “No, I do,” he said quietly. 

Now the heat he felt was his own. And he was certain Sean could feel his heart bumping against his back. Sean turned gently to him, fisting his jersey and pulling his head down. 

“Enough talk,” he said, and he couldn’t have agreed more.

~*~

On Monday morning he decided he ought to at least go in to work and pick up the personal messages that wouldn't get forwarded to his cell phone.

That morning he woke up to the smell of apples, walnuts, and…coconuts.

_Waffles._

But Sean didn't have a waffle maker so he paid attention as his half-sleeping brain assured his growling stomach that what he was smelling were only some weirdly scented aromatherapy candles. He had a better idea. 

Reaching groggily across the bed, he pulled Sean's pillow toward him and burrowed his face into it. He laid there filling his lungs, feeling as if he was going to explode.

He would never get used to this. Everything felt different. _Real._

He buried his face deeper in the pillow. But after only a few seconds of getting high off the heady scent, he tossed the pillow aside and decided to go get it from the real thing. 

He pushed up and rubbed his eyes as he shuffled through the always too-bright bedroom, following his general sense of direction into the kitchen where he found Sean standing at the counter. 

He went over and dropped his forehead on the back of Sean’s neck while his hands found their way down to the front of Sean's jogging pants where it was toasty. And within seconds he was warm, melting into Sean's bare back. 

And just like that, being out of bed didn't seem so bad.

“Morning, beautiful.”

He mumbled a reply.

After a while, Sean said, “I thought you'd be more excited.”

“What?” he asked hoarsely, still trying to wake up.

Sean leaned to one side so he could peer around him. He did, and saw the source of the aromas. There were cracked eggs shells, a bowl of batter, cut apples, and pieces of walnuts strewn all over the counter. Sean reached over, flipped the lid on a brand new, shiny black waffle maker and revealed a big, fluffy, perfectly golden waffle nestled inside. His jaw dropped.

“You ever had carrot cake waffles?” Sean asked. “Carrots, walnuts, apples...” Sean pointed to the fridge. “And coconut whipped cream.”

His brain did something funny. “Coconut whipped...”

“Thought you might want real waffles made from real batter on your first day back to work, for a change, instead of that sawdust you eat.”

Sean picked up a fork, cut a tiny portion of the waffle and brought it up to his mouth. He leaned forward and took a bite. The flavors hit him hard, considering that he had been ready for it. Sean scooped what was left of the whipped cream from the bowl and he watched in wordless horny fascination as Sean plopped it on the waffle. 

He had no idea where horny had come into it.

Sean picked up the waffle, bringing it to his mouth, and he stood there and ate the whole thing…while Sean licked whip cream from the corner his mouth.

_Oh._ Well, there was the horny part. 

And then Sean gave him one of his secret, sexy smiles. “Still hungry?”

~*~

Having failed to show up for work in over a week, and dressed in a jersey and causal pants, he tried not to look too closely at anyone. He felt as if he had a hickey everyone could see.

“Holden!”

He looked up to see Craig, his friend and one of their VPs, coming down the corridor. 

“Is this you? I had no idea you'd— _Were_ you on a trip?”

“No, not on a trip. Well, maybe. I was— uh…” He pressed a finger to his eye, trying not to let his thoughts wander too far. “I was busy. And I'm also not here right now.”

Craig nodded with concern, his eyes following his every move. “Is everything all right?”

“Yeah,” he said quickly. 

But it was too late. He was burning up with a horrible flush, as his mind had turned on high definition images of Sean dumping dollops of coconut whipped cream on his cock, then getting on his knees and telling him to hold still. 

“Everything's great. Everything's— just— It's good. Everything's good.” He needed to get out of here before he stared blabbering.

Craig kept staring at him, probably to make sure he was seeing him turning red for no apparent reason. Then Craig's eyes landed on the ring that was hard to miss.

Craig actually rocked back on his heels. 

Then Craig caught himself, seeing his state, and nodded officiously. Then, clearly trying not to smile, Craig waved him a quick goodbye and continued on his way down the hall.

He hurried into his office, kicking himself for acting like a loon. He probably shouldn't wear the ring until he could react like an adult over it. 

He found he had two messages.

One he decided to ignore, also choosing to ignore the feeling of dread it settled in the pit of his stomach, the other delighted and surprised him and he immediately returned it.

~*~


	2. Chapter 2

He scoped the lobby, waiting to catch sight of her. He was surprised by how excited he was at the prospect of seeing Captain Kate Hazeltine, the Army captain he had befriended on the flight back from Leipzig. She had called and said she wanted to thank him for lending her his airport pickup on Valentine's Day and wanted to buy him lunch.

They were meeting on the Westside though he had told her it wasn't necessary for her to come all the way from the Valley, he was fine with going up there. But she had assured him it worked for her, as she was going to be at the Veteran's Administration Hospital on Sepulveda that morning. Oddly, they were meeting in the lobby of a daycare in Westwood. 

He saw her as she was slowly pulling open the glass lobby doors. She was out of uniform and wore jeans and a flannel shirt. And she had a cane. His heart contracted at the sight. 

She walked over with a pronounced limp that was obviously painful. But her smile was still the same. And she had a little boy of about seven or eight with her. They hugged like old friends. He pulled back and she gently ruffled the side of his head. 

He smiled at her. “You look great.”

“Thank you,” she said, and already he could remember every moment of their long flight together, her simple, frank way of speaking.

“Are you all right?” he asked, looking down at her leg.

She gave a shrug. “Eh.”

He squeezed her shoulder. “I'm sorry.”

She waved a hand. He looked down at the kid who was gazing up at him while she tilted her head at the boy.

“ _This_ is my guy,” she whispered.

He frowned, wondering what she meant, then suddenly remembered how he had grilled her about “her guy,” the person she was rushing home to be with on Valentine's Day, presuming him to be a lover.

He closed his eyes, mortified. “Oh my god.”

She let out a burst of rich laughter, introducing the little boy to him, then sending him off to play in the day care. He smiled sheepishly, and they began a slow walk out of the building and across the street. They found a café and he held open the door for her as they entered.

“God, I'm so sorry,” he repeated as they took their seats, feeling even more ridiculous when she continued to laugh. “I projected _so hard._ ”

“Yeah, ya did.”

A waitress came by and they gave their orders for iced teas. Then he sat forward and insisted that she tell him how she was doing.

“What happened?” he asked, pointing to her leg.

“Improvised explosive device,” she replied. “I was lucky.”

Her rotation hadn’t supposed to end for another ten months, but almost all the soldiers who hadn't died in the convoy she had been riding had been sent home.

“I've got four surgeries scheduled so far, but,” she said, shrugging, “at least I get to keep the leg.”

He stared at her. Her brown eyes looked tired, slightly more hollow.

“I'm so sorry,” he said, and it didn’t seem nearly enough.

“It's okay,” she said, leaning in. “It's not why I called you up for lunch.” 

She’d tracked him down through Redmond, who had given her his work information. He mentally kicked himself for not having given her at least his cell phone number. Because of that her message had been sitting there for over a week.

“It's too bad Sean won't be joining us,” she said, widening her eyes. “You gotta forgive me but he's the one I _really_ wanna meet. You can't imagine my _shock_ when I saw the two of you on TV.”

“That was the prevailing feeling at the time,” he said, laughing.

“Cause he may be a top quarterback in the NFL and all, but that was quite a play. Coming out of the closet to win you back?”

“Well,” he hedged, trying not to preen. “He did it for other reasons.” 

“Not really,” she said, grinning.

He made a face. “Yeah, you're right. He did it because of me.”

She broke into peels of laughter, and he felt himself quietly laughing as well. They toned it down as the waitress appeared and placed their drinks on the table. She wisely offered them more time to look at their menus.

“So did it work?” Kate asked, pressing a hand to her chest to catch her breath.

“Did what work?”

“Coming out for you!” she cried. Then she deepened her voice, and did a pretty good imitation of Sean's Midwestern accent: “I’m gay. Dot dot dot. Any questions?”

He howled, and she howled, and he thanked God they hadn't picked up their drinks. 

“So did it work?” she repeated, gasping.

“I'd say it worked. We're getting married.”

She stopped, blinking at him. He brought up his hand and turned the ring a hundred and eighty degrees so she could see it. Her jaw dropped.

“Is that— _real?_ ”

“That's what _I_ said!” he cried.

And then neither of them could talk for the next minute, they were laughing so hard. She threw up her hands, and he threw up his hands, perfectly aware of how crazy it must all sound compared to the last time they'd seen each other.

“W-wow. So how'd _that_ happen?”

He thought about it for a moment and said, “I'm not sure.”

The waitress, coming to take their food orders, did a U-turn. They had broken into yet another round of laughter.

“I'm serious,” he protested, wiping his eyes. “One minute we were broken up and the next I was— Well, there was yelling. I remember a lot of _yelling—_ ” she snorted and he had to make an effort not to start laughing again “—and then I was saying one yes after another.”

She sat back, letting out a huge breath. “That's insane.”

“You're telling me.”

“But— you're there with him?”

He nodded. “I believe I am.”

“Not afraid of what might be coming down the pike?”

He met her eyes, then lowered his. “I think that— I think as long I keep an eye on me, we'll be all right.”

She nodded, understanding. “No longer being the enemy.”

“That's the idea.”

“That's very brave of you. Both of you.”

She picked up her iced tea and gave him an encouraging smile. “Here's to giving in to the best parts of us.”

He raised his glass, smiling widely. “I'll drink to that, Captain.”

~*~

God help him, he was trying to teach Holden how to use aromatherapy candles. 

It had been Holden's idea and not his. He'd told Holden he needn’t feel obligated to learn anything but Holden had insisted, saying a person could never have too much zen. Well, Holden had none, which was why it had seemed a good idea at the time.

They were sitting cross-legged on the floor opposite each other, the living room lights turned off and the room lit with the most fragrant of a new set of his candles. He closed his eyes and instructed Holden to do the same.

“What am I supposed to be thinking about?”

“Nothing. That's the point.”

“Well,” Holden said. “The minute you say nothing I have to think of something. It's just the way the mind works.”

“Not every mind. And you're also not supposed to say anything either.”

“Not _say_ anything? What is this, a hostage-taking?”

“Holden,” he said warningly. 

“Okay, fine.” 

The room went quiet. Just when he’d prepared himself to take a deep breath— 

“Wait, I think I can see the candles flickering behind my eyelids. Is that supposed to happen?”

He slowly opened his eyes. After a few moments, in the silence that his impatience had generated, Holden slowly opened his as well. His dark blue eyes shifted self-consciously.

“Oops. I'm sorry, I just realized I wasn't supposed to—”

He leaned forward, narrowing his eyes. They had been at it for half an hour. Nothing requiring not talking and the simple act of breathing should take this long. “Pretend you're mad at me,” he said. “Pretend you're mad at me and…I’m the only one in the room—in the _limo_ —with you.”

Holden looked at him from under his lashes, a smile curving his lips. “Jerk.” But he closed his eyes. 

“Now take a deep breath…” He closed his eyes and did a slow count. “Hold it… hold it some more…” 

“Oh my God, I can't breathe,” Holden gasped.

He reopened his eyes and stared at Holden. Holden opened his and stared back.

“I couldn't breathe.”

“That's the point,” he said. He let out a breath. “All right, let's try it again.” 

They both closed their eyes. 

“This is gonna be a long night,” he muttered.

“And I still don't see the point, to be honest. I've concentrated harder listening to rock music. And what am I supposed to be smelling again?”

“Lilacs.”

Holden snorted softly. “You're such a princess.”

“You're not allowed to say another word. You have to take in a breath, hold it for five _long_ seconds, then release it.”

Holden did just that. Slowly, he did it again. 

He opened his eyes and watched in amazement, seeing the lines on Holden's face ease and a genuine look of relaxation come over him.

He didn't want to close his eyes, he wanted instead to appreciate the moment—the candlelit room, the night lights coming from the water, the sweet smell of lilacs. And the beautiful man sitting across from him.

But he did just that and absorbed the quiet, the soft, rhythmic sounds of the ocean from where he could hear the faint hiss of surf on the shore, and the distant cry of—

“I'm _staaarving._ ”

He slowly opened his eyes and didn’t even attempt to keep a murderous look from them. Holden was making a face, his eyes still closed. 

“Why am I so—” Abruptly, he stopped talking and silently mouthed an, “Oh.”

And at that moment Holden’s phone buzzed. Holden slowly opened his eyes, narrowing them with a faked, upset expression. “How dare that phone interrupt us.”

He dropped his head—this is what he had committed to—while Holden jumped up to answer it. He took a deep breath and got ready to try again. But Holden's phone was still buzzing. He turned to see why Holden hadn't answered it. 

Holden was standing in the kitchen holding the phone, staring down at it with a clearly distressed look on his face. But before he could ask anything the phone stopped buzzing. He waited a little longer, waiting to see what Holden would do, until he realized that Holden was waiting for it to go to voicemail. 

No notification came that it had.

“Are you all right, Holden?”

“Yeah,” Holden said brightly, looking up at him. “I’m good.” He left the phone in the kitchen and came back and sat across from him. 

“Now, where were we?” 

He must have been frowning, because Holden waved a hand, his face tightening, and shook his head. “Come on,” Holden insisted, beckoning with both hands. “Give it to me. We're getting me zen.”

He hesitated, and then put it aside. There was nothing he could do if Holden didn't want to talk about it. He nodded and instructed Holden to close his eyes, which Holden did.

~*~

June slowly bled into its second week, and Holden had to go back to work. They just couldn't put it off any longer. But that didn't mean he had to make it easy for Holden.

They stood at his front door, fingers tangled, kissing for what felt like hours. Holden was fully dressed in a suit, and he was shirtless and still in his joggers, more than mildly aroused. Neither was he making it easy on himself.

He would never have believed that going back to the real world would prove so rough. But they had sustained their sphere of two for longer than he could have hoped for. And it was with real appreciation for how far they had come together that he let Holden go.

~*~

Within days being apart seemed like the craziest thing in the world. And for nine hours? Insane. 

He harassed Holden on the phone all day, sending him text messages that said essentially that there was someone in Malibu who wanted to see him, stat.

Holden always sent back the same response: “Tell him to call my fiancé.”

It amused him endlessly that Holden didn’t seem to have anything wittier than that to say. He wanted nothing more than to climb into bed and talk all day on the phone, like a lovesick teenager.

Paula was not amused. June was technically his month to begin physical training and get back into the mindset for team training in July, but that was only technically. Most players did squat during June, except probably fight off their managers and agents.

“Get your butt in here, Sean, or risk having having me show up and ruin your party.”

“Paula,” he coaxed, grinning to himself as he leaned over his balcony railing and gazed out at the water. “There's no need for that kinda talk. I'll be in there first thing in the morning.”

“You said that three days ago.”

He scratched his beard. “I'm pretty sure I called and told your secretary I had to cancel.”

“That's not the point and you know it. What are you _doing_ over there, anyway?”

“I'll be there in the morning. Promise.”

~*~

It turned out he had to first find himself a new trainer.

Because, Paula informed him when he went in to see her the following morning, the old one had up and quit on them, saying that he didn’t want a gay man looking up his shorts while he tried to coach him football.

Paula had relished telling him that story, crowing, “It’s always the _ugly_ ones, too, right? I bet you even his _wife_ doesn't touch that thing until the check clears.” And then she had shuddered dramatically, and he had laughed, feeling  better about the departure. He’d worked with the trainer for two summers, and had thought they’d had at least mutual respect for each other’s competency. 

Well, he needed to prepare himself anyway. There was more of that coming in the fall.

So, he was sitting later that evening on one of the living room sofas, his feet up on the coffee table and looking at resumes for a potential replacement, when Holden's phone buzzed.

And like the first time, he only looked up because Holden didn't answer it. 

Holden was sitting at the dining room table working on his laptop. He didn't decline the call, didn't even reach over and hit the button to stop it from vibrating. He just sat there staring at it, as if afraid to touch it, until like last time, it stopped.

He watched the display a while longer, to see whether Holden would even check and see if the caller had left voicemail. But Holden didn't. He just returned to his laptop, his expression obviously troubled.

“Sweetheart,” he called gently.

Holden didn't look up. “Yeah?” 

“You might feel better if you talked about it.”

“I feel fine.”

He kept watching. Holden was staring at his screen, obviously not seeing a thing, obviously waiting to see if he would let it go.

He let it go.

~*~

It wasn’t until the following morning while he was taking a shower that Holden wandered in to talk.

Holden was dressed for work in a dark blue suit and vest, and looked fucking good.

He squeezed shampoo into his palm while his body hummed with the thought of wet hands slicking soap all over him. He flicked a look at Holden to check out his level of amenability.

Holden had a furrowed brow, with fingers hooked into the front pockets of his jacket. 

Apparently not very. He placed the shampoo bottle on the stone shelf and turned the water down to a trickle, and began lathering his hair. Keeping his eyes on Holden, he watched him shift from one foot to the other.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hi,” Holden replied, then went silent.

“What's going on?” he asked casually.

“My dad wants us to come up to Bel Air.”

He stopped shampooing, caught off guard. That was definitely not what he had been expecting.

“He wants us up for a visit,” Holden elaborated, pressing his lips together. “He wants to meet you.”

Slowly lowering his arms, and wiping shampoo off his face, he ventured, “That's good, right?”

“No, it’s…great.”

“Was he the one who kept calling?”

“Yeah…”

Phone calls aside, he'd been on the wrong side of Holden's _How did I get here?_ tone enough times to know what to say next.

“What's on your mind?”

Holden looked up. “What?”

“Why are you worried about your dad? You think he won't like me?”

“ _No,_ not at all. It's more like…” Holden fell silent for a while, shifting a couple of times. Then he said with a sigh, “My dad can be— Well, my _parents_ are—” Holden stopped, then tried again. “My parents can be annoying sometimes.”

“Everyone's parents can be annoying.”

“Not like them.”

“Oh, stop it. It'll be fine. It's nice of your dad to ask.” He looked over at Holden for confirmation. “Right?”

“I guess…”

He turned on the water and breathed as the fat water droplets hit his chest. Holden had ordered the enormous shower head to replace the one that had come with the house which Holden had felt was too puny. 

Now he watched the soapy water run down his chest, soak the hairs around his sex before trailing down his legs. He looked pointedly at Holden, then let his eyes roam the glass walls of the walk-in shower. The lower half of the stall was frosted, but he was pretty sure Holden could see his condition.

Holden shook his head, giving him a very sweet smile. “I have to get to work.”

“I didn't say anything.”

Holden laughed and dropped his hands. “I’ll see you later, quarterback.”

And then he was gone, leaving him soaking shampoo from his hair, wondering exactly what he was missing.

~*~


	3. Chapter 3

Alastair Wilson was a fascinating man.

Tall, brown-haired and occasionally too direct-eyed like his son, he might, in many ways, resemble what Holden would look like in thirty years.

Additionally, he talked as much as Holden did when Holden was happy. He wasn't boisterous, or really even loud, just open and curious and full of the need to be entertained.

And like his son, he was one of the most personally intrusive people he had ever met. Though not necessarily in a terrible way.

He was thinking this as he stood on the second floor landing of the Wilson family home, watching father and son bickering at the bottom of the stairs.

The Wilson estate was a fifty million dollar classical French mansion sitting on 2.5 acres of premium Bel Air land, and was, in a word, impressive. He had nearly laughed aloud when he had walked in and had seen where Holden's preference for decorating came from. Holden might not have wished to come home, but he had definitely taken it with him when he left.

Alastair had laughed when he had told him that, throwing a triumphant look at his son. Holden had ignored him and had merely gone on looking nervous.

It was that interesting dynamic he was seeing as he waited at the top of the stairs, trying not to seem like he was listening to their whispering argument. 

They appeared to be exchanging words over him.

Alastair had greeted them the moment they had pulled up in Holden's Lexus, coming down the wide stone steps like a Roman senator with a big smile on his face.

Holden had sat in the parked car and stared nervously at his father, a look on his face as if he had been on the verge of blurting out a revelation that never came.

Finally, he had placed a hand on Holden's leg and said, “Sweetheart, relax.”

Holden had turned to him with a look like he had dropped out of a clear blue sky, and had told him he was relaxed.

And so they had greeted Alastair. 

Now as he waited for Alastair to join him where he had sent him to wait on the second floor landing, he watched Holden talking firmly in a low voice, his jaw set in a way that meant he wasn't asking to be countered.

Alastair was chuckling and waved aside his son's concerns. “I promise, I promise,” he heard Alastair saying, reaching for the banister and hauling himself up. “Now go, go, go. You have some people to say hi to, and I gotta take Sean on a tour of the abode.”

Holden looked up at him, meeting his eyes and holding them distinctly. 

“Don't let him make you tell him anything you don't want to,” Holden called up.

Alastair, coming up the stairs, laughed as if it was the funniest thing he had ever heard.

He raised a hand to Holden and mouthed, “I'll be fine.”

Holden hesitated, then nodded, before turning toward the interior of the house.

Alastair, still grinning, finally reached him on the landing and indicated with a sweep of his arm that they move on to the second floor. 

He looked in that direction and saw that the second floor had a balcony that ran the entire length of the house. They fell into step and started up the rest of the ways toward it.

“Pay no attention to Holden,” Alastair said. “He always thinks I'm up to no good.”

“And I take it you’re not?”

Alastair turned a look at him.

When they had first arrived Alastair had shaken his hand with a warm grip, his eyes sizing him up not once, but twice. He’d withstood the scrutiny with pride, his mother having taught him to be properly dressed for any occasion. He had chosen casual but smart, his black sport shirt and beige chinos blaring “responsible boyfriend,” and Alastair hadn’t indicated by his expression that he had been disappointed.

“Haven't had the time,” Alastair said in response to his question, apparently deciding that he had a right to ask. He stopped and pointed to their left. He turned and looked.

To his amazement, the wall was covered with old black and white photographs that, when he moved closer to see, were photos of endless tracts of dry, undeveloped land. Peering at the inscriptions, he saw that they were photos of Bel Air and the surrounding Santa Monica Mountains, back when the land was still being parceled out to developers.

Fascinated, he moved along the wall and shook his head in wonder at the pictures of Alastair as a boy, hip-high to his own father and standing on tracts of land all over Los Angeles.

“It was a boomtown for sure and we were always ahead of the curve,” Alastair said, a note of pride in his voice.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “Seems like Holden is constantly boarding a flight to somewhere to close a deal.”

He moved to the next set of photos, a more recent bunch, to see Holden no older than six or seven, in his turn standing on dusty tracts next to surveyors and landscapers. Another set showed Holden swallowed up by a big office chair situated behind an even bigger oak desk, pretending to look through a pile of paperwork. The inscription by the photograph read _Future CEO, Wilson Realty._

He smiled at the familiar look of concentration on little Holden's face. 

“Cute kid,” he told Alastair.

Alastair chuckled. “And one was enough.”

“How long has your family lived in L.A.?”

“Six generations. We go way back. Real estate developers, council members…thieves. We're practically native.”

He laughed and continued to follow the photos, during which a silence descended. After some time, Alastair gently cleared his throat. He kept his eyes on the wall, waiting for the interrogation he had assumed would be inevitable.

“So,” Alastair began softly, as if not wanting Holden to somehow overhear. “Was that...uh...an engagement ring I saw on Holden's finger?”

He straightened from the wall. “Yes sir, it was.”

“You asked him to…marry you?”

He nodded, and turned to look at his future father-in-law. Alastair merely stood there, his eyes on the floor, scratching his temple. Then he gave him a confused look.

“And Holden said yes?”

“Yeah.” 

He said it without skipping a beat, and with that unhesitating answer felt as though he had made up for weeks, months, even years of emotional uncertainty.

He wasn't insecure about Holden's freakout when he had proposed, but he was pretty sure no one had to hear about it.

“That's amazing,” Alastair said softly, his brow furrowed just like his son's. “Quite amazing.” Then he sighed. “Well, Holden was always full of surprises.” 

He shrugged a little and nodded.

Alastair slanted him a look. “Where're you from, Sean?”

“I'm from Iowa.”

Alastair nodded, contemplatively. “Cause you know,” he then said. “You don't sound very much like a football player. At least not the ones on TV.”

“Yeah, I get that a lot,” he said slowly. “It's what I am, though. Played football all my life.”

“That's a…pretty crazy world though, the NFL, isn't it? Being on the road more than half the year, never really seeing much of your family. You always wonder how that works.”

Well, clearly this man had thought about just how it worked, because he didn't think even Holden could tell him how many months out of the year he was actually gone.

“For the wives and so forth,” Alastair clarified. “Or I should say, significant others.”

“Ahh…” He was stalling for time. It was a conversation he would one day have with Holden, but one he hadn't wanted to think about for as long as he could put off. He sure as hell hadn't contemplated having it with Holden's father.

Alastair suddenly threw up his hands and reached forward to put a hand on his shoulder.

“Sean,” he said, as they resumed walking. “You gotta know when to stop me.”

He laughed, relieved. 

Definitely different from the impression Holden had given him. He thought they'd get along fine.

~*~

“So, Holden, you're getting married.”

Holden froze, the serving spoon in his hand hovering over the serving dish, and turned a pointed look in his direction. Before he could ask what he had done wrong, Alastair spoke up.

“Holden,” his father said firmly. “You're wearing an engagement ring.”

Holden's eyes dropped to his left hand. Apparently he had forgotten that he’d put it on. Holden’s expression tightened.

“Holden, why the hell didn't you say something?” Alastair asked. “Your mother's going to have an aneurysm. Did you kids set a wedding date already, for God's sake?”

“No, of _course_ not. I was going to tell you and mom at some point.”

“Oh?”

He kept his own eyes on his plate. If Holden was at fault then so was he, for not making sure Holden's parents knew. _His_ family knew. 

He stole a look across the table and was surprised to find Alastair, far from combatant, with a huge grin on his face. He glanced at Holden but Holden was piling food on his plate.

“Holden is pissed because he loses the bet.”

“I'm not pissed, and we never made a bet. I just took a position. And I don't think we should be talking about it.”

“You took the position that you would never get married. At which point I then bet you a hundred dollars that you would. Before your fortieth birthday. In fact,” Alastair continued, shifting forward in his chair like he was about to indulge in gossip, “I specifically remember saying—”

“Dad, no.” Holden was pinning his father with an intense look. “I said we’re not having this conversation. Now, not ever.”

“Fine, fine,” Alastair grumbled. Then he whistled softly. “You got your hands full there, Sean.”

He met Alastair’s eyes and distinctly said, “ _I_ like it.”

“Well, then, good for you.” But Alastair's grin got wider. “Oh boy, is this going to be interesting.”

~*~

The day went perfectly well, as far as he could tell. Their lunch, set in one of the three gardens behind the house, had been laid out by the household staff, whom he discovered were the people Holden had left to say hi to when they had first arrived.

As with nearly everyone he met, Holden talked to them as if their problems were his own, listening and offering any kind of advice or solution in his power.

When they had sat down for the lunch, Holden had asked his father, looking around, where Beau, his current wife was. Holden had told him that he didn’t refer to her as his stepmother because aside from being five years older than her, he was expecting her to be gone soon.

Alastair told them she had decided to spend the afternoon with friends. And that was all the information either of them exchanged about the woman.

Alastair and he had talked football, which Alastair had followed briefly during the seventies—but he was a golfer, through and through, he cautioned. He’d dipped his head in acquiescence. After that the conversation had turned to land development, a topic he could appreciate especially since Alastair had proved as knowledgeable about Malibu development as anything else.

Eventually Alastair and Holden had discussed a new account that Holden had just closed, and he had listened with a feeling of contentment, feeling that things were slowly but surely coming into place.

And when they finally left, Holden had seemed much calmer, more relaxed than when they had arrived.

It wasn't until they were driving back up the Pacific Coast Highway, the Pacific light skimming off the water toward their left, that he thought about the fact that no one had spoken a word about the family who had lived in the house that Holden called home.

~*~


	4. Chapter 4

Holden's mother, naturally, asked to see them next.

And, Holden told him, standing in the foyer to his penthouse, she and Alastair were planning to make a weekend celebration of it, come next week.

He was at Holden's place since Holden had worked late the past few nights, and had gotten totally lost, not only in being in the confines of this place, but in sifting through league paperwork from Paula. Holden had announced his news as soon as he’d walked through the door, in an apparent need to get it off his chest as soon as possible.

He saw that the look of nervousness was back on Holden’s face. 

So he smiled and said, “Okay.”

Holden tossed his briefcase on a chair.

“Well,” he said tenuously, “if she's as evil as your father, I can see why you're nervous.”

“I'm not nervous,” Holden said immediately. “I'm just…” Holden looked down at the ground, then again at his briefcase. “I just have a lot on my mind.”

“All right,” he said, and waited. For Holden to stop fidgeting, for him to tell him what _was_ on his mind.

But Holden did neither. He just muttered that he was going to take a shower and left the living room.

He looked on after Holden had left. Holden never left him alone when he was feeling weighed down, and God knows there had been plenty of times when he had been reluctant to discuss what was going on inside him as well. He sighed and put down his paperwork.

He ought to know when to leave work behind and go comfort his honey.

~*~

They met Holden's mother on Saturday at the Bel Air Country Club, where she was poolside with friends. 

Cecelia Hadley-Wilson was an observant, self-aware woman. Average height, blue-eyed, she sported a shoulder-length and obviously expensive haircut to her silver and blonde hair. She looked nothing like her son, until she smiled, and then her eyes, her mouth, her entire face, suddenly became Holden's. Unfortunately, however, and despite a friendly enough air, she didn't appear to be the type that freely gave out smiles. 

She was surrounded—or, as he discovered after they had been there awhile, attended might be the better word—by a group of women and men of varying ages, who like herself seemed to consider sitting poolside to be an occupation.

She spent the first ten minutes gently berating Holden for his lack of etiquette in failing to inform either of his parents of his engagement. And Holden did in fact look contrite. All her friends seconded her opinion, and Holden, greeting them by name, introduced him to the group at large.

A double chaise was brought over by a Club staffer and placed next to Cecelia's patio table, where two friends were sitting with her. The chaise became his and Holden’s station for the afternoon.

Cecelia seemed to like him well enough, and she very much liked the ring, but she didn't seem to have much to say to him. She’d instead held Holden's finger in front of her face and looked expressionlessly at the ring for a while, then said, “It's lovely. I have nothing to complain about.”

Holden had brought his arm back down and had said absolutely nothing.

~*~

“Your father and I are each planning to throw you a party, after which we're going to have a brunch right here at the Club,” Cecelia was saying.

Holden didn’t respond, only went on stroking his hair. Lying beside Holden with his face buried in Holden’s neck, he had long been praying for the afternoon to be over.

Facials, collagen injections, redecorating, exclusive travel destinations… yachts, personal shoppers, shopping assistants, pet boutiques… he had heard people with money complain about stuff, but these people they didn't even know what _stuff_ was. Their only sense of anything happening outside in the world was when it appeared to affect their strange, disconnected life of luxury.

His brain would have long ago fried, except that it was being kept on a slow sizzle with Holden absently running his fingers through his hair. Holden was gently massaging his scalp, lovingly rubbing his fingers into it, then soothing where his skin tingled so divinely. Nothing in the world should feel this good with clothes on.

Earlier he had wandered off to try talking to a young guy about his age, an investment advisor, but had ended up spending an hour listening to him talk about the ins and outs of celebrity home extensions. He hoped his glazed expression could have been attributed to the very hot day. 

The investor's desperation to be a part of the idle rich had struck him as downright freaky, and after leaving him he had wandered back to Holden's side to be held captive by Holden’s heavenly fingers and had given up trying to be interested in much else. 

However, now he paid attention. He had been trying all afternoon to catch snatches of Holden’s conversation with his mother, but there hadn’t been much of it.

“Alastair is over the moon about Sean,” she now said, “and wants to introduce him to just about everybody.”

“That's nice,” Holden said lifelessly.

“I thought you'd be more excited!” she cried. “A new addition to the family? It's very exciting!”

“Yeah, hi. Can I get an iced tea, please.”

He involuntarily raised his head at the sudden change in conversation, and saw that there was a server standing over their table.

Holden turned to him. “Sean, what do you want?”

He couldn’t stop himself from glancing at Cecelia, interested to see how she would handle the clear brush-off. She seemed to not have expected a response, and in fact she and Leona, the friend sitting next to her, turned to each other, picked up their drinks and began laughing under their breaths.

He did his best to hide his surprise. His mother, quiet as she was, would have taken his head off had he dared ignored her. He lowered his head back to Holden’s shoulder and softly told him he would have iced tea as well.

He had just started thinking that he couldn’t be more grateful that it was getting to be evening, and that he was looking forward to returning to his quiet little world, when Cecelia and Leona started to talk. And somehow, amidst the other conversations going on around them, he could distinctly hear the two women’s words and he found himself listening.

While the server returned with their teas and Holden held his glass while he took a sip from his, Cecelia and her friend started discussing a friend who had just bought a “small place” on the beach down in Florida. Because, it seemed, and they said this with tremendous relish, her husband had just clocked in on “the rule of seven.”

“Though in his case,” Leona said pointedly, “it was three.”

“Ouch. Who is it, the new one? Do we know?”

“Oh sure. She works at one of their servicing firms. I know, the cliche of it.”

“I wonder what Lacey's next move'll be,” Cecelia said, her voice soft with intrigue.

Leona observed that it was hard to tell, since the friend Lacey had already made boards of trustees for all of her husband’s corporations, and had since brought in an appraiser for all the pieces, of estate furniture, he presumed, that she wanted from the house.

“Despite their prenup?” Cecelia asked.

“Ah, but see that's the interesting part. We were all saying five years, right? Well she bet on less than four, and her bet paid off. Contingencies, you see.”

“Outsmarted him in the prenup. Good for her.” There was a moment's pause. “So who do you think she'll go for next?” 

There was a brief silence, and he waited as well. They appeared to be discussing someone’s divorce, but they were talking about it as though it was a spectator sport. He couldn’t help sneaking a look.

“Larry,” Leona finally said.

“Nevins?” Cecelia scrunched up her nose.

He watched, fascinated despite himself. In a different situation he would have been charmed by how much she looked like Holden when she did that. But not right now.

“Larry's strictly unattached affairs with builin-in expiration dates,” Cecelia said to her friend. “Lacey's looking for marriage.”

“Hmm, true” Leona conceded. There was a pause. Then— “Sean.”

He looked up at Leona, making sure to keep his look polite and interested.

She sat up straighter and fanned herself. “My goodness, aren't you a handsome one,” she breathed.

He blinked stupidly at her. She laughed.

He had, of course, been hit on by older women before, but never in public, and not in that blatant tone of voice. Holden let out a tiny sigh that only he could hear. 

“You have to tell us, Sean darling,” Leona said. “Is it true that in professional sports you can practically write off a divorce?”

Cecelia’s eyes went wide, her mouth equally so, and she practically fell over laughing. He glanced from one woman to the other, then at Holden. Holden's eyes were pinned on the other side of the pool. 

Looking in that direction, he saw that Holden was following the progress of their server, who was coming toward them. He threw Leona a quick look.

When they had initially arrived, Cecelia’s friends, led by Leona, had expressed intense excitement in meeting him. Then they had bombarded him with enough questions to fill out a questionnaire, on everything from where he first met Holden to what, exactly, his profession entailed. He had been momentarily weary, and then he had let it be. But now he was wondering whether he should have been more careful in how he had responded.

The server had reached them. “Everything all right here?” she asked. “Can I get anyone anything else?'

“We'll get a couple of waters to go,” Holden said, before anyone else could speak.

The server left while Leona turned an admonishing look on Holden. “You're not leaving before we go inside for drinks, are you? We just got to meet Sean.” 

Cecelia pursed her lips in a way that he supposed was meant to be a smile. But she didn't say a word. 

“We have to head back,” Holden told her by way of explanation. 

Then he was having to move as Holden got up. Holden went over and leaned over his mother. “Mom?” 

“All right, darling,” Cecelia said, sitting back to receive his kiss. “Drive safe.” She kissed the air around his face, then turned a smile on him. “Nice to have you in the family, Sean.”

“Thank you,” he said, already on his feet. He had made sure to keep his voice deep, and firm, wanting to leave them with no impression other than there was nothing to be unsure of here.

Holden took their bottles of water from the server as they left the Club.

~*~

They drove back to the Westside in silence, and he decided he wasn't going to say anything negative about the afternoon. Holden was still a little distracted and mentioning anything while he was driving didn't seem like a good idea. 

Rather than driving them to his place, however, Holden made a left on Santa Monica and headed through Beverly Hills, into West Hollywood. The gay party scene in WeHo wasn't his thing, which Holden knew, so he sat quietly as they turned up a quiet condo-lined road and came to a stop in front of a swank, unmarked hotel.

The valet collected the key, and he followed Holden through the lobby into a dark door on the other end. A wide bouncer raised a hand at Holden and they went in.

The lounge was dark inside, upscale, and full of quietly whispering people. He squinted, recognizing a few celebrity faces.

He followed Holden to the bar, where they sat side by side. Holden ordered them drinks, then placed both his elbows on the bar before running his hands through his hair. A short, relieved breath followed quietly.

“What,” he asked, turning to face Holden on the stool, his legs on either side of him, “is the _rule of seven?_ ”

Holden lowered his arms, his head still down. “It means you leave whomever you're with after seven years, because that's how long two people can stay enamored of each other, or be together.”

He stared uncomprehendingly. Holden didn’t look at him. The bartender suddenly dropped their two martinis and Holden tightened his lips in an attempted smile of thanks and reached for one. He watched as Holden lifted his glass, in silent toast to whatever madness he had just given voice to, and took a sip.

“Holden,” he said softly. He presumed this strangeness with his family was what had been making Holden nervous. Holden had been diplomatic in calling it _annoying._ “I've lived in L.A. for six years and had never really met anyone from Bel Air, you were the first. Now I think I see why. It's like a…” He tried to find a polite way to put it. “It's a different world up there. I mean even for L.A.” 

Holden ran the tip of his tongue along the inside his cheek. “Oh, well.” Then, after a pause, “Let's talk about something else.” 

“All right,” he agreed, leaning in to rest his elbow on the bar and intentionally crowding Holden’s space. “When are you going to call off those bodyguards?” 

Holden threw him a look, which he found really sweet, and laughed. “Not any time in the foreseeable future.” 

“I go on the road in less than two months.”

“That's fine. They'll be here when you get back. As long as you're in L.A., people know where you live. While you're on the road, it's not an issue.” 

He smiled, liking the way the words made him feel, and reached forward to tuck back wayward strands of hair that Holden’s hairpulling had disturbed.

“One of them's kinda hot, actually,” he said softly. “Maybe I _should_ take them on the road with me.” 

Holden fought a smile. “You just keep talking, Sean Jackson.”

“Forget talking,” he said, reaching for Holden's fingers. He trailed his fingers along the long, firm digits. 

He was going to have to 'fess up that he loved Holden's fingers, with their wonderful, unrehearsed intuition. And as he finished the thought they came alive and tangled in his. He pulled on them and Holden met him halfway, turning to stare with great absorption at his lips as he spoke.

“You look good,” he whispered, staring in turn down the front of Holden's open-necked jersey. He felt his tongue moving on its own at the sight of smooth chest hairs that greeted him. “Why don't you give me a kiss me and we can forget all about this fucked up day?”

“I’ll do you one better,” Holden said, standing up as he set down his drink. He stood up, following, his hand still in Holden’s, thinking that they were leaving. He was about to remind Holden that his credit card was still at the bar but Holden began heading towards the back doors instead, out onto a garden terrace. 

Patrons were sitting at wrought iron chairs further out, but they stopped way before getting there as Holden shrank back into a dark recess. He went with him, getting out of the main thoroughfare and pushing up against him until he felt the stone wall against his knees.

Holden stood between his legs, his hands going into his hair and dragging him closer. He kept still as Holden licked his mouth, licked his tongue, deliberately made his mouth feel like he was being sucked somewhere more intimate.

His breath caught in his throat, his body reacted with a thrust of his hips as he took Holden by the waist.

He didn’t think he’d have to worry about forgetting about today.

~*~


	5. Chapter 5

Holden’s parents had planned a cocktail party and then a brunch for them the coming weekend, and Holden insisted to his mother that they consider neither events to be engagement parties.

He had told Holden that his sister Allison had told him his parents were fine with not being able to attend, and to Holden that had been reason enough to not humor his parents with official sounding designations. Especially when, Holden had informed him, his parents had sprung the events on them. So the cocktail party was merely being called a way to “introduce” him to their Bel Air community.

Holden was lying propped up at one end of the sofa, his phone to his ear and their movie on mute, and he was lying between his legs, his head on his chest. He could hear the whole conversation.

Holden told his mother “Fine,” and hung up. Then he asked him whether he had heard all of it. He nodded. He didn't care either way. Their families were so far apart that the thought of having an engagement party had never crossed his mind.

But the next morning he told himself that at the rate things were going he ought to take care of a couple of things. It was looking like Holden's parents were going to demand a whole lot more of his time before this was over.

So he calendared his bi-monthly with Kara and went in to see Paula…only to discover that Paula had gone by their regular schedule and arranged for his new trainer to start working with him that very weekend.

He shifted his eyes to the floor of Paula's office. “Ah…”

It was midmorning and the sun was shining on another gorgeous, cloudless day. Paula looked like she had just gotten a massage and was sitting back in her chair in a relaxed manner. That was good for him.

“That's a very big ah,” she told him.

“Yeah…” he stalled, scratching the side of his face.

Paula dipped her head, lifting her eyebrows. “ _Now_ what?”

“I'm thinking of pushing training till July.”

“What?”

Hm. So much for being relaxed, that was her flat, “I'm going to kill you” tone.

“Things just kind of piled up all of a sudden.”

“ _What_ piled up? You can't start training when you get _down_ to San Diego, Sean. Uh-uh. You're already a month behind schedule. Come August you'll get on the field and feel like you've been kicked by a horse. Keep up with the level you reached during the season and you won't regret it.”

“I know, I know, and I can catch up. I just need a little time.”

“Time for what? Tell me already.”

“I…ah… I asked Holden to marry me.”

Paula blinked at him. Her expression remained blank.

“So now I'm engaged and I’d…I’d like some time to just take it easy. Get some things taken care of.”

Paula's face had compressed into a frown. “Who the hell is Holden?” Then her eyes went wide. “The _guy?!_ ” And then, to his surprise, a big bright smile lit up her face. “Congratulations, Sean.”

“Thank you.”

She held out both palms. “All right, that's fine. I'm not in fact a heartless, soul-sucking fiend like the rumors say. You have until the end of the month. And then I'm going to be all over your ass like a rash.” She elongated a finger at him. “I don't give two shits about that Youth Camp for the kids, but training begins for you July first. Get all your nasty business taken care of before then or we're both in hot water.”

He broke into a grin. “Sure thing, boss.” He stood up, walked around her desk and kissed her on the cheek while she made a guttural, disgusted sound at the literal kissing up. “Thanks a million, Paula. You're my number one.”

“That's pathetic, Sean. Get out of here.”

~*~

Kara liked it even less. She chewed on her thumbnail and muttered her reasoning to him.

They were in a coffee house in Malibu, rowdy even at eleven a.m. They sat at a corner table and discussed the coming months. 

Kara was telling him that she would have to delicately word the press release saying that he wouldn't be starting training until he joined the team in July, but that even then the media commentary would be rough.

He raised an eyebrow, thinking about it for a moment, then shrugged when he realized he couldn't care less. He took a sip of his coffee.

Kara looked very good, despite the nail-chewing. Holden had told him that she and Kelvin Moore, the news anchor at KVLA who had said all those nice things about him, were dating.

He couldn't help but wonder which had come first, and amused himself wondering whether Kara had enough shark in her to make Moore do it because they were sleeping together. He'd be the first to admit it would turn him on if Holden didn't put out until he satisfied certain conditions. He'd bitch about it, but he'd probably be hard the entire time.

“They've been rough enough this off-season,” he told Kara about the potential talk from the sports press. “I think I can handle it.”

“All right,” she replied. “If that's what you want.” She paused, spat out chips of her nails and picked up her mug for a long drink. Abruptly, she set the mug back down and blew out a breath as she shook her mane of hair.

He smiled to himself. She was one of the most bizarre people he had ever met.

Her biggest concern, however, was that July was the month in which the Youth Camp would take place. Because they had fought so hard with the Family Research Council over it, she wanted to make certain his participation was a slam dunk.

“I'll be there,” he assured her.

“That's all I need to know.” She took another gulp of her coffee. “How's Holden, by the way?”

“He's good,” he replied, nodding. “He says hi, and hopes the two of you can work together again soon on some new plan for world domination.”

That cracked her up. He sat back, startled at what was probably the first time he had ever seen her really let go like that.

She wagged her finger at him, snorting coffee. “Tell him he should give some serious thought about going into publicity.”

“God, no,” he said, aghast, feeling laughter building up. “I _won't_ be telling him that.”

She tilted her head to one side, her smile still on her face. “Well, you look good, Sean. Content.”

“Thanks. I got nothing to complain about.”

“Awesome. Well, okay. I gotta run. Congratulations again on your engagement.”

“Thanks, Kara. Hey, and keep givin' 'em hell.”

“Will do.”

~*~

Had he believed it would have helped, he would have gone ahead of time to his father's house, where he and Sean would be staying for the weekend, to first make sure nothing funny had been planned. 

But the fact was that it would make no difference. He could ask his parents to please be on their best behavior and they would say oh, sure, no problem, and then go on and do or say whatever inappropriate things they wanted to anyway. If only he could be assured that they wouldn't drag Sean into any of their appalling games.

Ever since admitting to Sean that he didn't think of growing up in Bel Air as a life populated with “real” people, he had become all too self-conscious of the fact. And honestly he couldn't remember the last time he had been self-conscious about anything.

Sean, on the other hand, was more than ready to go. The “strangeness,” as he had called it, didn't really seem to bother him. He was looking forward to spending time with his future father-in-law, whom he really liked.

He could have shot himself. 

But who could say, he thought as he sat with his arms around his knees, watching Sean stack shirts into a weekend bag while telling him about his meeting with his management team. The things he found frustrating and discomfiting about his family might be, for Sean, like water off a duck's back.

After all, Sean had weathered all _his_ vagaries and was still here. Maybe he was just seeing it all wrong.

Either way, come Thursday night he would be calling to make room reservations at the Hotel Bel-Air.

~*~


	6. Chapter 6

They arrived at his father's house early Friday afternoon.

Beau, his father's wife, was there to wave perfunctorily at him as she trotted down the front steps to her Jaguar. He didn't spare her a second glance as Sean looked over his shoulder at her departing figure, as she hadn't stopped to so much as say hi to Sean, and he wasn't about to waste his time.

They followed his father upstairs and to the section of the house with the guest bedrooms. There, he had an unexpected moment of a melting heart when upon discovering that his father had assigned them to one room, Sean blushed rather furiously.

His light eyes flashing across the room from where he stood on the other side of the bed, Sean requested in mostly an unclear growl that they take separate bedrooms.

His father, standing between him and Sean, chuckled. “Are you sure now, Sean?” he joked, jerking a thumb in his direction. “Cause God knows, during _his_ teens I heard all _kinds_ of absolute—”

“Dad, no.”

His father stopped, and even from his angle by the door he could see him giving Sean an “Oops” look.

“Never heard a thing,” his father whispered, waving a concession at Sean. “You pick wherever you want to sleep.”

Sean nodded politely, thankfully apparently not interested in acknowledging his father's words. Sean started toward them and for the door. He held up a hand.

“I'll get room across the hall. You stay here.”

Sean stopped where he was, nodding. Sean still wasn't looking at him. 

His father clasped his hands. “All set then. See you boys in a few.” He smiled widely at Sean. “Good to have you here, Sean. I promise you we'll have fun.”

He was silent, moving aside as his father departed past him, his eyes still on Sean. 

Sean was sliding his weekend bag off his shoulder and onto the bed. He seemed tense, but he couldn't tell whether it was residual from the room situation, which he knew Sean took seriously, or feelings about the irresponsible thing his father had hinted about his teenage years. Because as far as he knew, Sean had never seen him with another guy and after just having gotten engaged, it was the very last image he wanted planted in Sean's head.

“I'm sorry you had to hear that.”

For a few seconds Sean didn't reply, just slowly unzipped his bag. Then he said, “Don't worry about it. Dads—they run their own shows.”

Sean's voice sounded strained.

He hovered hesitantly by the door, his hand loose on the handle. 

“Okay,” he finally said. “See you in a bit.” He turned the handle, then turned back to Sean. “Just push the button to call any of the staff. Or— just knock if you need anything, I'll be across the hallway.”

“Yeah,” Sean said in a vague way, and he hastily exited and closed the door behind him.

Out in the hallway, he stood staring down the long landing toward the staircase. No father in sight. And why would he be, when he had already stirred things up enough for the moment.

He had an awful feeling that he knew exactly what was coming, that his father was testing the boundaries of his future son-in-law’s moral terrain. 

Alastair was trying to see what kind of a person Sean was, whether he would be interested in partaking in the kind of lifestyle he and his friends regularly indulged in. He knew it like he knew the back of his own hand. All Sean had to do was reject him. That no thanks, that kind of flippant attitude wasn’t for him.

He would explain all of this to Sean, but for the life of him he didn’t know how.

~*~

Ostensibly, his parents’ plans for the weekend were straightforward enough. A sit-down dinner at the Bay Club with Alastair and his friends, to which he wasn’t invited, he was told, so that Sean could get a chance to get to know “the guys” without his inquiring eyes. Whatever.

After that was the main event, a cocktail party at his mother's house just up the road, for her and _her_ friends, even though it was all the same circle of people he had known growing up. Then on Sunday it was brunch at the Hotel Bel-Air, for the rest of the world to see and envy he presumed, though by that time he and Sean might actually be guests of the hotel, depending on how things went here.

But all Sean did was smile and kiss him over and over on the side of his mouth when he tried to express his concern as he and Alastair prepared to leave for the Bay Club.

He was headed out to dinner himself to meet friends he hadn't spent a lot of time with over the past few months, and couldn’t stress the conditions enough.

“It's just going to be the same crap from when we were poolside with my mom,” he told Sean, his eyes roaming to where his father was getting into his Bentley coupe. The older his father got, the sleeker the cars became. “They've all been married ten times and they love bragging about it. It's all just a— bunch of fucking—”

“Sweetie.”

He stopped and looked at Sean.

Sean touched his cheek. “I'll be fine.”

Sean was smiling in that slight, easy way he had. He nodded and stepped back, knowing when to get out of the way, and Sean hurried over and hopped into his father's car. He watched them drive away.

~*~

Pretty early into the dinner, virtually once they had sat down and introductions were made, it became clear to him why Alastair had insisted on inviting him to meet his friends.

It was a table full of business moguls, investment bankers, ex-politicians and hedge fund managers, some young, some older. It seemed that the Bel Air community started them young and took care of them through life. 

As long as, he suspected, they played by the rules of the community.

And just as Holden had feared, within minutes of putting in their dinner orders the conversation centered on how many affairs, prenupped marriages or divorces were taking place among their acquaintances at any given time. Interestingly, a handful of them seemed to be the husbands or ex-husbands of the women he had met at Cecelia’s pool party, and he found himself wondering whether the Larry sitting across from him—a well-groomed man in his fifties—was the same Larry Nevins whose relationships came with automatic expiration dates.

Their basic disposition seemed to be a disdain for anything approaching society’s expectations as a whole, believing them to be rules laid down for other, less dynamic people. Rejecting the commonality of that seemed to be their great philosophy in life.

He listened with only half an ear as…Darren Moran, he believed the guy's name was, was telling it to him.

Darren was a young, very good-looking guy about his age, and the quintessential go-getter. He spoke loudly and confidently, and was explaining that “the club's” idea of handling their businesses like a turning wheel of change and adaptability, well above staid societal rules, was applied throughout every facet of their lives and even into their private lives. And that it was how they had all found so much success in life. _Or, you were born into it,_ he couldn't help thinking. The two guys with Darren—from the looks of it his “crew”—were nodding in agreement.

He could have told Darren that he couldn't agree more about change and adaptability, but if this so-called philosophy was their excuse for emotional and sexual promiscuity, something he found very immature, they could go ahead and keep it.

Instead he kept his thoughts to himself, giving only an ambiguous tilt of his head, and concentrated on eating his meal. But his eyes kept wandering to Larry Nevins. Over-groomed and very much removed.

Was that the future he had saved Holden from?

~*~

“Wow, what an evening.”

He turned and looked over his shoulder at Sean. 

He was sitting on the edge of the bed in the room Sean had taken, and Sean was lying behind him, still jacketed, tie loosened, shirt and trousers still on. He had one arm flung over his head, and his eyes were closed. He looked wiped.

“Are you going to make it?” he asked with concern.

Sean sighed, still not opening his eyes. “Yeah, I'll make it. It's exhausting, is all, like being on all the time. On and playing a role. I’m not sure how you do it.”

“I can tell you,” he said without skipping a beat. “You just keep your eyes on whatever prize you want and forget everything else.”

Sean slowly opened his eyes and looked at him. “That should be easy enough,” he said softly.

He blushed, and smiled. Sean was the very soul of romantic.

“Are you really going to make me go sleep in another room?” he asked, turning to look pointedly at the large, empty space on the bed next to Sean. “If you're worried about your friend Alastair overhearing, you don’t have to be. The master bedroom is about ten years down the hall on the other side of the house.”

Sean's hand, till now lying dormant on his stomach, involuntarily inched downward before he seemed to catch himself. 

But not before his own eyes had followed the movement. His tongue slipped out and slid across his bottom lip. He couldn’t help it. He heard Sean laughing softly. 

“Get outta here, Holden.”

He sighed and stood up, bending over to lightly kiss his fiancé on the forehead. Sean reached up and fisted his shirt, pulling him down for a scorching taste of his mouth.

Sean broke the kiss and left them both taking slow, deep breaths. He looked down, narrowing his eyes.

“Sorry,” Sean whispered.

“Grr.”

He straightened, heading for the door. “Sleep tight, Sean.”

“You too, sweetheart.”

 _Eyes on the prize,_ he thought as he opened the door. _I can do that._

~*~


	7. Chapter 7

Saturday morning turned out much better. 

He took Sean to his old grade school and showed him where he had received his first kiss from a boy.

“I was four years old and this rowdy boy named Ralph who wore only Lacoste shirts, though at the time I thought the alligator was baby Godzilla so I was even more terrified of him, ran up to me while I was standing over there in that spot. He just cornered me and I froze. Then he laid the biggest smooch on me.”

Sean was grinning, staring across at the concrete playground from where they were sitting side by side on a low wall.

“What'd you do?”

“Shrank back and screamed my head off.”

Sean dropped his head and laughed _his_ head off, and he started laughing as well.

“Your turn,” he said. “What'd you do for your first boy-kiss?”

“Well, for one thing I was a lot more suave than that. And it was after gym class, of course—”

“Why of course?”

“Because that's when I used to shine. I always did great in gym class.” Sean paused, thinking. “And I was ten.”

“Ten,” he said, snorting. “A late bloomer.”

Sean chuckled. “There was this kid…” Sean went quiet. “You know,” he acknowledged, “I don't even remember his name any more. But he sucked at gym and all the other kids used to tease him. One day when he and I were picked to put all the jump rope and basketballs away, I told him I could teach him to catch better if he liked. He just stood there and moped at me with this sad, really sweet look on his face. So I grabbed the ball he was holding to keep him still, leaned over, and kissed him.”

Sean stopped, chuckling softly. When he looked over at Sean his eyes were far away.

“You know I haven't thought about that in a really long time.”

“What, the fact that you have a soft spot for nerds?”

Sean threw him a shy look. “I wouldn't call it a spot.”

His jaw dropped. “Did you just call me a nerd?”

Sean laughed softly, then pushed against him with his thigh. He looked down, the movement having shorted his thoughts.

“I'll tell you another secret if you like,” Sean said. 

Sean’s voice was suddenly very close. “What?” he asked, turning so fast they almost cracked noses.

Sean put a hand on his thigh, leaning closer, and whispered a hot gust of breath into his ear. His eyes widened, almost popping out of his head at Sean’s words. He turned slowly, his face heating up as he looked at Sean. Sean lifted an eyebrow, shrugged matter-of-factly.

He blinked, in a bit of a daze, and heard Sean laughing softly to himself.

~*~

The cocktail party filled up quickly. 

His mother had invited practically all of lower Bel Air and half of Beverly Hills, and despite the short notice most of them had ditched their prior engagements for a chance to see the man who, amidst all the hoopla and media fanfare, had finally netted Alastair Wilson's son. And a football player at that! Good golly! 

He and Sean were split up almost immediately, which he had expected, his father latching onto Sean and disappearing with him like a kid with a new toy.

Sean looked gorgeous as always, relaxed in a fitted suit, no tie, and his shirt open at the collar. And he was full of ready smiles. If the Bay Club dinner had freaked him out, then their afternoon together had apparently cured him. 

Following their tour of his childhood haunts they had visited his childhood nanny, the woman who had helped raise him until he had left home for USC. Some of her family still worked for his father, and she had been overjoyed to see him, with a fiancé no less. She had done a great job of embarrassing him with choice stories from his clumsy childhood, which was her prerogative, of course. And then she had plied them with way too much empanadas and ice cream. 

He was pretty sure Sean had gotten buzzed from the sugar rush, because he was still buzzing from the unexpected shock of Sean's big hand suddenly sliding up the front of his jersey under the table. The act had apparently gone unseen, but not the sharp yelp he had let out and then tried to cover up as an ice cream headache.

So all in all it had been a good day and he, like Sean, was left feeling fantastic. Which was perhaps why, later on that evening, his mother’s words hit him so hard.

Initially, the booze not yet having kicked in, the conversation flowed around the usual cocktail party topics of politics, art and philanthropy. But soon after, the real topic of interest started freely kicking around, and he wandered the party having to turn a deaf ear.

He contemplated how disappointed a lot of them must be, discovering that Sean wasn’t flamboyant or loud, or interested in being the center of attention. They had by and large come for bawdy Vaudevillian-style entertainment, and what they were getting could only realistically be compared to a Bach concert at the L.A. Philharmonic.

His father had sent him in search of his mother, to let her know several guests were looking for her, when he came upon her and her friends in the informal dining room.

The four women were seated facing each other across the table, his mother and Leona on one side with their backs to him, and speaking in perfectly audible tones. He entered the room amidst a group of exiting guests, and first heard the tail end of what Leona was saying.

“…so all that running around with jocks in his teenage years didn't tip you off?”

“Those were his teens. He hasn't gone anywhere near those sorts of boys in ages,” his mother was saying, and he slowed to a halt and remained, as if instinctively knowing, by the doors.

“I honestly thought he would end up with Darren Moran,” his mother went on. “You remember Nicola Moran's son? The one who went to Stanford business school with him?”

The friend across the table, a silver-haired woman he had known since childhood, gave his mother a doubtful look.

“I don't know, Celia. Nicola made a lot of noise about it, but money speaks to money, and they didn't have a lot of it.”

“Despite the show she put on,” the one seated next to her added.

“All right,” his mother dismissed. “My point is that I was glad when he stopped hanging around those ridiculous boys from whatever sports teams at school. I see now that I was merely jumping the gun.”

“So he likes athletes,” Leona said in her high, lilting voice, shrugging. “That's not a bad thing. Not all of them are incurable whores.”

“You mean men,” the silver-haired friend asked. “Or just football players?”

The women burst into quiet laughter. He realized he was shrinking further back into the doorway.

“But who knows,” said the fourth friend, the one who had questioned Nicola Moran's net worth. “This one might be different. And that ring has got to count for something. I had Holden show it to me. Did you guys see it? Cut, color, clarity…flawless. Was it fifteen carats?”

“Fifteen point five,” his mother said. “I had Alastair's guy at Harry Winston check on it. He paid three million for it.”

There were appreciative murmurs.

“See? He could be perfectly serious.”

His mother sighed. “I sure hope so.” She paused, and he realized he had stopped breathing long ago. “Had I known he was looking to settle down I would have introduced him to a hundred more appropriate men.”

“Knowing Holden,” the silver-haired one slyly replied. “You still can.”

And this brought down the house.

He moved into the room.

It was the fourth friend, sitting opposite his mother, who saw him first. She blinked rapidly at them and he saw his mother stiffen. 

However, she didn't turn around.

“Hello ladies,” he said. 

The women, all except his mother, turned and gave him coolly impeccable smiles.

“Having a good time, mom?”

“Always, dear.” She lifted her head, still not turning around. “Give us a kiss.”

He and bent over, clutching the back of her chair for support, and placed a small, slow kiss on her cheek.

It was how he felt. Small and slow.

“Dad wants you,” he said, and those were all the words he was capable of saying. She slowly stood, excusing herself from her friends. He moved aside, and she left the room.

Keeping his eyes averted from the women at the table, he headed aimlessly towards the French doors and out onto the outside patio.

The garden lights called softly. 

He stood looking vacantly around. Somewhere towards the middle of the garden a handful of his father's friends were standing in a semi circle with Sean among them. Sean had his arms wrapped around his chest, no drink in hand, and was nodding politely at what was being said. He moved to one side, settled himself into an alcove, and stared disorientedly at Sean.

He loved Sean with everything in him. Sean was the only man he had ever dated, broken up with, and tried so hard to forget, and had utterly neen unable to. 

He had sexual dreams about him, something he never experienced with anyone else, and was mentally subjected by his own psyche to all kinds of deeply personal and intimate thoughts about him. He wanted him _all_ the time.

He couldn’t imagine that he would leave him, or grow bored of him, simply because time passed.

And yet nothing his mother had said had been a lie.

He was everything she had described. He had always liked being around guys like Sean. He liked the way they made him feel, liked being in bed with them.

But he had thought that what he had with Sean was unique.

But right now he was thinking about his conversation with Sean their night out on the boat, how Sean had stayed monogamous to him for three years while he had gone out and sought the company of other men. Unhesitantly.

Was it that he had been different just a few short months ago, before committing to Sean? Or could he still go out and do something like that now?

Did he have the capability to love just one person as Sean did?

He trembled, suddenly feeling chilly in the night air, and wrapped his arms around himself.

He was being crazy. Just because he had dated other guys when things weren’t going right with Sean didn’t mean he planned to throw it all away the moment he was faced with a hurdle. What kind of person would that make him?

_Just like everyone else._

He froze, tightening, as the quiet voice inside him subsided. His eyes flew to where Sean stood, his heart ramping into overdrive as if Sean might have heard. Then he forced himself to drop his arms and look at Sean. He had changed. _Sean_ had changed him.

But if he had changed, why was he standing there having these thoughts?

“Holden!”

He started, turning at the sound of his mother’s voice. He peeked out from behind the alcove and saw her leaning out of one of the French patio doors, waving at him.

“Guess who's here!” she called in a sing-song voice. “You'll never believe it. Come inside!

~*~

The cocktail party, essentially, was weird. To him, anyway.

He might one day get used to these bored, gossipy people, but tonight was clearly not that night. And preoccupied with trying to get a grasp on Alastair and Cecelia’s relationship, he missed hearing the real gossip of the party until it was way too late. 

He'd wanted to grasp their relationship so that he'd get a better understanding of where Holden might be coming from since they didn’t seem to talk about their family life beyond anything superficial. It appeared that both parents were still on the same charity boards, in the same clubs, on the same invite lists… In fact it seemed that the only thing that had changed as a result of their divorce was Cecelia’s home address. He couldn’t help but wonder how that sat with Beau, Alastair’s current wife.

He overheard his first inkling of what the party guests were really talking about when he decided to escape an especially chatty member of Darren Moran’s crew. Moran must have arrived at some point but he certainly had no interest in seeking him out. He vaguely told the guy that he was going to look for a server with more champagne, and got out of there.

He had found his way into the relative quiet of the corridor leading to the kitchen and was about entering when the doors swung open, a drunk guest shuffling out. He grabbed the doors and saw Larry Nevins standing to the side, eating off a tray of hors d’oeuvres and talking to a woman he had never met.

“I'm telling you, Holden got engaged out of boredom,” Larry was saying. “Happens to the best of us.”

It made him stop, wait by the doors.

“But to a football player?” the woman was asking.

“He's not a bad catch. You should see what they make in endorsements.”

“Right. Say that now when Man of the Hour is still young and good-looking. But try selling it when he retires and gets fat and starts cheating on Holden, and Holden still looks gorgeous.”

Larry laughed, shaking his head as he bit into a shrimp cocktail. “Trust me, this engagement won't change anything.”

“Well, being gay men and all…”

“Exactly.” Both of them laughed.

He had heard enough. Letting go of the kitchen door, he left the area as fast as he could. At the living room entrance he stopped, trying to control his shock at what he had overheard.

What the fuck?

What the fuck was wrong with these people?

He found himself staring at a server holding up a tray of champagne, looking patiently at him. Then he realized he was blocking the entrance to the living room from the kitchen and moved aside. The server thanked him and came by, and he snatched up a champagne flute before he could change his mind.

Before he could turn back around and go ask Larry Nevins what made him think he could make such remarks about his private life.

He downed champagne like a drink of water.

“Would you like another, sir?” the server asked him, slowing.

“No, thanks,” he said, and placed the empty flute back on the tray and walked into the living room.

He looked across the room only to see Cecelia talking closely to Darren Moran, laughing and swatting him on the shoulder like an old friend. Then he watched as Holden arrived, handing them both drinks and giving Moran a brief smile before taking a sip of his.

Holden had started talking to his mother, but he didn’t for a second miss the look Moran was giving Holden, because he'd once given that look himself. 

He clenched his jaw, feeling like he would like nothing more than to chew something off. And then he saw the self-satisfied smile Cecelia had on her face while looking at Holden and Moran, and he knew he needed to get out of there.

Staying to the corners of the room, he made his way toward the main doors until he had cleared the threshold and felt like he could take a deep, lungful of fresh air.

He let out a breath.

Okay, fine. So he could recognize trash talk when he heard it, on or off the field. It was just that something this personal required a different kind of mindset, one he hadn't prepared for. 

Where he came from people talked behind your back where they were sure you couldn’t hear them. Not within earshot of you and yours, and definitely not at your own engagement party. And they at least had the decency to call it what it was—just plain dirty gossip—not try to dress it up in something fancy like a “philosophy.”

It was just idiocy, that was all. In time he would develop a thick skin against it like anything else.

He sighed once more, feeling much better. He’d thought the afternoon by the pool with Cecelia had been trying. But at least then he had had Holden giving him some love the entire time.

Someone called his name. He looked up. It was a friend of Alastair’s, waving him over from a small group of people smoking on the cobblestone drive. She was an older woman, a lesbian, and a football lover just like his sister, and one of the relatively sane people he’d met tonight. 

He gladly went over.

~*~


	8. Chapter 8

“That had to be, without a doubt, the strangest, most obnoxious party I’ve ever attended. And it was supposed to be my engagement party.”

He shook his head, sitting on the edge of the bed, and covered his face with his hands. “Those people were enough to make you give up on humanity.” He shook his head again, just appalled at the stuff he had heard. “Just the absolute worst.”

There was silence at his words.

“Yeah,” Holden finally muttered in a very tiny voice.

He looked up at Holden.

They were spending the night at Cecelia’s after having seen the last of the guests off, and Holden was standing by the door next to the dresser, staring at the finger he was using to bore a hole into the top of the dresser.

He noted the glazed expression on Holden’s face. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Holden said softly, though it was painfully clear that he was trying to keep from showing some kind of confusion he was going through.

“Holden, it’s obviously something. You didn’t hear some of the stuff they were saying about— Uh, about us, did you?”

“Yeah, I did.”

He stood up and slowly walked over, watching Holden tense as he got closer. He pressed up against him, put his arms all the way around him and making sure there wasn’t room for air between them. He gently kissed the side of Holden’s face.

“It's all bullshit. I don't have to tell you that, right?” he asked quietly. “I mean, at first it was pretty shocking— I honestly can’t say the last time I heard adults gossip so freely, and with the person right there an' all. But, after about my third or fourth time walking in on it,” he noted that Holden didn’t so much as crack a smile at his joke, “I decided I’d ignore it all. It’s just a bunch of drunks trash-talking, right?”

“Yeah…”

He tilted his head, staring closely at Holden. “What is that, your third _yeah_ in a row? Sweetheart, what's on your mind?” Then he stopped, thought about it, and said, “You’re not worried I’ll grow fat, are you?”

Holden frowned at him, confused, and perhaps also a tad impatiently. He grinned down at Holden. “Some woman talkin' smack about me said you'll leave me when I get fat and you still look hot.”

Holden looked like he had run out of the ability to try and figure out what he was saying. He lowered his head and kissed closer to his lips. “I’ll still chase you though,” he whispered into his ear. “Still make it worth your while.”

Holden twisted slightly, as if wanting to get away.

He pulled back back and stared at Holden’s downcast face. “Sweetheart—” he began, squinting. Then his tone changed. “You're not actually worried about me getting fat are you?”

“Sean,” Holden bit out.

“Then what is it?”

“ _Nothing._ ”

He dropped his arms and took a step backward. Rather than feeling sympathy for whatever problem Holden was clearly having, he felt anger rising.

“I'm going to give you one minute to tell me what's on your mind, Holden.”

Holden looked completely panicked, and for some reason that made him even angrier. And then it hit him why.

“You _believe_ in all that crap, don't you?”

Holden’s eyes moved to and locked onto the gleaming dresser.

He went still, trying to control the furious response rising inside him, and couldn’t. “That's why you were so fucking nervous about bringing me here. You buy into all of that— all that elitist _horseshit_ about—” 

He stopped himself, feeling his hands trembling. He didn’t move a muscle, afraid that if he did he would grab Holden in a way that he would absolutely regret.

Instead he raised both his hands, and moved around Holden.

Holden seemed to have not seen him move. He was opening the door before Holden had turned around and was gripping his wrist.

“Sean,” Holden croaked.

“Holden, this is not happening,” he said quickly, forcing himself to not turn around and let Holden see the hurt look on his face. “I'm way past this.”

He opened the door and slammed it behind him as he left.

~*~

Two days passed, and he still couldn't work up the nerve to call Sean.

They had each retreated to their side of town, he to the Westside and Sean to Malibu, where he couldn’t so much as drive anywhere near without feeling a generalized sense of panic.

The brunch at the Hotel Bel-Air the morning after the cocktail party had gone perfectly fine, if you happened not to notice that neither of the engaged pair were speaking to each other except when necessary.

Leona and his mother had surely noticed, giving each other raised eyebrows behind raised glasses of tea.

Frankly, he thought Sean had handled himself well, considering that he had done nothing but sit there radiating anger, so deathly quiet that his hands had been shaking throughout the brunch. Sean had afterward made some excuse and had Alastair drive him back to Malibu instead.

In bed that Sunday night, he had dialed Sean's number twice before quickly disconnecting and staring at the phone for long minutes afterward. It was only in the clear light of a new day, at his desk on Monday morning, that he had been able to drum up the courage to try again.

He listened to the line buzzing for a long time. Sean didn’t pick up that first time.

When the ringing stopped, he lowered his phone, told himself he could do it, and tried again. This time Sean picked up only after a couple of rings.

Sean was at an NFL function. It reminded him that this weekend was the Fourth of July. He looked forward to staying at home and doing nothing all by himself. It was noisy in the background and their connection was bad. And after two days to think things over, Sean was succinct.

“I don’t want anything to do with any of you.”

He should have steeled himself harder. It hurt way too much. Even knowing that Sean couldn’t possibly mean it, it cut in a way that made him glad he was sitting down.

“You have to,” he said softly.

 _“Why?_ ”

“Because they're the same people who'll capitalize your foundation.”

There was a pause. Static scratched all over the line.

“Fine, if that’s how it’s gotta be. But I don't want you anywhere near me.”

He closed his eyes against the pain blossoming in his chest. It was so bad that upon opening his eyes everything was blurry. His throat was fast closing off, but his mind was pushing out words faster than that.

“Sean, you promised me,” he whispered. “Do you remember? You promised you would take care of me.”

“Don’t tell me the things I’ve promised you, Holden.” And even through the noise and interference he could hear the words coming through Sean's teeth. “Or the things I’ve done for you. Our world, we make the rules. Remember _that?_ What I need is for you to be _different._ ”

“Different how? From what I told you I was? And you accepted it when it was easy. But now that it's real, now that it’s trying to hurt us, you want me to— You want something different,” he finished quietly.

“You know what, I can barely hear you. You're going to have to call me later.” 

“Sean!” 

But Sean had already hung up.

~*~

He went to the VA to see Kate.

The Veterans Administration Hospital was only ten minutes down the boulevard from his office, and unlike most people he enjoyed driving in L.A. Nevertheless, he nearly got into two accidents on the way there and couldn’t have been more relieved when he parked his car and stepped onto the manicured lawns.

It was another Monday morning, Fourth of July weekend having come and gone. He had ended up spending it on the East Coast with friends in the Hamptons and it had been a decent distraction if nothing else.

His conversation with Kate that morning had only been him calling to say hello, and to hear her welcoming voice on a morning on which he couldn’t get any work done. But she had suggested he come on down. 

And as soon as they were hugging, he knew she had made the right call.

She indicated that he follow her and they began walking the winding path on the grounds. They went twice, chitchatting, before she stopped beside a bench and let out a huge breath. 

“Okay, we gotta sit down now.”

“How many miles a day did they say you had to do?”

“Two miles.”

He squinted across the grounds, trying to gauge the length of the path. “I don’t think—”

“Guy, sit.”

He smiled, having almost forgotten her firm, commanding voice, and did as she asked. She settled on the bench and rested the cane beside her leg on the other side of them. Then she spent sometime situating her leg in a more favorable position, breathing hard with the exertion. 

She had had the first of her surgeries, and by the time he was done reminding himself what real hardship looked like, he decided he didn’t want to talk about his problems.

They went on chatting about other things: the veterans healthcare system, bad airline food, crazy stuff on Facebook, what she and her son did for Fourth of July.

Finally she turned to him with her knowing smile in place. 

“So, what's up.”

He waved his hand. “It doesn't matter. It's something I probably need to learn how to fix without dragging anyone else into it.”

“Oh, come on. I know you didn't call me up just to come hear about ma' bum leg.”

“I care about your leg,” he said, surprised that she would feel that way.

She made a face, waving a hand apologetically. “I didn't mean it like that. I know you care.”

He sighed, heavily. Of course she knew. He was reacting like a lunatic.

“But come on, out with it. I heard it in your voice over the phone.” And when he still hesitated, she said, “It'll make you feel better, instead of having your face all scrunched up like that. Like my son's.”

He began smiling. And before he knew it, he was telling her all about the mental state he was in. How he had spent the last week thinking, and how he felt disconnected.

“I…I think I’m becoming the enemy again,” he said sadly.

“So stop doing it,” she replied.

He looked at her, trying to absorb how simple it sounded. 

“I don't know how,” he finally said, looking at his hands. “What I feel about him is completely real. One thousand percent. But what he’s asking is for me to take a leap of faith. And you know, after the whole FRC debacle, I thought I had. I was _sure_ I had.”

“You seemed pretty sure when we had lunch.”

“I know,” he said in a whisper. “But the fact is that I haven't. I think you feel it when you've made a leap of faith. I don't know whether there's something wrong with me or whether I just don't have the tools to do it. No chisel, no rope.” 

He looked up, into the too-bright day. “If you asked me what my attitude was right now,” he said, “what it's been for the past week, I'd say defeatist. If I'm not— If I’m not the right person for him, I want to know. He deserves that.”

He stopped talking, trying to deal with how painfully simple that solution was, and how impossible it was going to be for him to have to implement it. 

For a while there was silence. Kate seemed to be thinking about what he had said, then she turned to him and said, “Want me to come with you?” 

He turned to her. “What do you mean?”

“To one of your parties. The Army spent all this money on my training and now I'm just sitting here. I could come and do some recon for you, see what's going on with you, and him… and your parents?” 

He started to laugh. She always seemed to make him laugh at the craziest things. “That'd be insane,” he said. 

“Says who?” 

“Says me!” 

She went silent. “Okay,” she then said, shrugging. “But the offer stands.” 

He looked at her, at her clear brown eyes and her wide, open smile. 

She seemed always to be able to conceal her game, to never give away her plays. He had learned that the hard way at backgammon.

“Thanks,” he told her, and looked thoughtfully at the ground.

~*~

“Allison, am I losing my mind? Am I an idiot or something?”

His sister had opened her mouth at the first question, let out of a breath and shut it at the second. He reached over and increased the volume on his laptop.

“You might actually be for handling it _like_ an idiot,” Allison said. “You really shouldn't walk out on your partner when they're admitting to you they're confused and might not know what they're doing.”

“He didn't say he was confused,” he said, a bit too loudly. “He said—” He stopped, and breathed. “Allison, all this time I believed in him because he's always been his own person. He has his own internal clock, for god’s sake. I’ve always respected that about him. But now to find out that he's just a— a crowd follower?”

“Did you yell at him?”

“Of course I yelled at him.”

“Hmm. The good ol’ anger response. Musta gotten you both far.”

“Don’t give me that,” he said, giving her a look through the laptop monitor. “He deserved it. He and his family are like a bunch of…  I don’t even know what the word is. It was like I was in a whole other country, dealing with some crazy culture I don't understand, or fit into.

“Did you tell him that?”

“Who, Holden?” He felt indignation rising again. “No. I'm tired of telling him things. He should be able to figure it out by now.”

Allison reached forward and tilted her webcam to an angle that better showed her darkened expression. 

“You want him to be a mindreader now, Sean? I keep telling you, don’t be mad at him because you think he’s crazy. At least he’s trying.”

“How? By acting like lobotomized sheep?”

“If you feel he’s lost his way, why don’t you just let him hang onto you until he gets there. He knows you're there for him, so don’t abandon him now or make him feel like a piece of dirt for not doing it right. Remember, the good with the bad?”

He nodded reluctantly, recalling what their parents had always taught them. He was stewing in his own head for a few moments longer before he realized that she had stopped talking. 

He looked into the monitor to find her watching him with a look of sympathy in her eyes.

“What?” he asked, just as reluctantly.

“This isn't really about Holden, is it?”

  _Of course it's about Holden!_

He had been about to say it, but the protest died as fast as it had come up. He looked miserably into his monitor. “Allison, I feel so— He makes me feel so—” 

He just couldn’t say the words.

She gave him a gentle, knowing shrug. “He's the love of your life and you want it to be perfect.”

He let out a breath and dropped his head. There, she had said it. It was just that simple. And after everything he had been through, didn't he deserve that much?

Goddamn it, it fucking hurt.

He raked his hands through his hair, feeling completely drained. He felt as though he had been holding his breath since last Sunday and that awful brunch in which he had had to sit there pretending he didn’t notice Leona and Cecelia’s smirks, and Holden acting like a scared, passive little kid the entire time.

His heart ached. And it ached even harder because it was Holden he wanted to comfort him.

“Allison,” he said hoarsely, staring forlornly at the screen. “Could you look into your crystal ball and tell me if we make it?”

“Through the good and the bad.”

He sighed, and held onto the words, taking them inside him and willing them to be true. He met her eyes and smiled. “Thanks.”

“There’s that winning Jackson smile! All right, two things. Barbecue on the Fourth was great, I'll send pictures.”

“Thanks,” he repeated softly, trying not to open up to any additional misery. Next year nothing would stop him from going. Being with his teammates was fun, but seeing their families and a whole bunch of kids running around had done nothing but make him miss his own family.

“Mom and dad know how hectic July can get for you,” Allison assured him. “They weren’t expecting you to make it. Two, Deena drew you a picture that's sure to put a smile on your face, even if a highly disturbed one. I swear to God, when she starts bashing kids at school with oblong-shaped objects, I'm sending the principal your number.”

He started laughing. “I'll donate some helmets and some shoulder pads. How’s that?”

“If I didn’t love you, Sean, dear…” She gave him a patient, motherly smile. “I'll go get her right now.”

“Yes, please,” he replied, and sat back as she went off to find his niece. 

He lowered himself in his chair, lacing his hands on his stomach and staring into the empty video screen.

And it was as he sat there quietly,thinking of his family, that memories overwhelmed him of the blissful feelings he had gotten when Holden had texted him his acceptance of his marriage proposal. 

_The answer is yes._

That was his Holden. Decisive, and confident enough to throw his own upbringing back in its face.

Where was that Holden now?

~*~


	9. Chapter 9

The Fourth of July holiday having passed, the month started proper. 

Orientation for the Chargers Youth Camp was scheduled for the second week of July to bring the kids, the Chargers who would be participating, their coaches and the community coordinators together. 

The Camp broke up the players' times into two- or three-day chunks  in the month, depending on how much time a player could give to the program. Each year he had done a minimum of five days, simply because he couldn’t get enough of those little kids.

But in the past it had been easier when by this time he would be down at his townhouse in San Diego going full tilt at his training. 

This year he was not only starting training in the same week, but he was going to have to remain in L.A. and do the two hour commute from there, if he wanted to take care of his life there as well.

The smart part of him told him to go down and stay down for the whole month, and to let whatever was going to happen unfold with Holden.

But the fool part of him, the part that Holden's new passive attitude seemed to have faith in, wouldn't let him do it. Therefore he was doing the damn commute.

~*~

That first day, he went down to San Diego for the Camp orientation and immediately got a spectacular reminder of what it was all about. 

He entered the meeting hall to the sight of hundreds of little kids screaming his name and acting crazy as only kids could, all because he was coming down to spend some time with them, and he forgot about L.A.

He looked around the stands at them—budding athletes like he'd once been, little kids in glasses who would get hit by the ball more times than they would catch it, kids in wheelchairs, all there to learn life lessons through sports as only pro athletes could teach them.

He saw their excited faces and remembered the promises he had made to himself when he had come out as gay in NFL, of the things he had committed to enduring in order to live a better, whole life. 

He realized that if he was seriously planning to become an advocate for gay and lesbian kids, then quitting because the world was throwing him dirty things wasn't an option.

These were the faces that were going to help him survive his new life in L.A.

~*~

It had become a mystery to him why Alastair Wilson had taken such a liking to him.

The man invited him out with such enthusiasm, seemingly genuinely disappointed when he said no, that he was beginning to wonder if he was missing something major.

Alastair had to have seen that there was a lingering strain between him and his son, and why continue introducing him into his society when he didn't even expect them to stay married for long?

And tonight was especially bad.

He was making the commute several times a week, going to event after event with Holden and his parents, and tonight Alastair had brought him to some arts-funding benefit at the home of a friend of Cecelia’s, a house in Hombly Hills even grander than his own, and in a community that thought even Bel Air a little plebeian for their tastes. He had ended up planting himself in a corner, from which he couldn't make himself move no matter how hard he tried.

In the middle of the foyer, surrounded by his customary harem of spoiled rich boys, Holden stood staring unabashedly at him, his deep blue eyes so easy to read even from this distance that he was blushing despite himself.

Holden had come to the party with a woman walking with a cane but at the moment she was nowhere to be seen.

He did his best to avoid Holden's intense gaze. 

On Sunday he had returned from San Diego to find a bouquet of purple and white lilacs blocking the entrance to his house, a note attached to it that read: _Missing you._ He had trashed the lot.

There was nothing he wanted to say and even less he wanted to hear from Holden. Holden's passivity was doing more than irritating him, it was keeping him furious. If Holden missed him so much, why didn't he just grow some balls and just walk away from all this? Tell all of them to go screw themselves?

Quietly, his mind raised the point that he was the one standing there complaining as though he had no free will, but he instantly told himself to not bother.

It was love, he was fucked, he was dealing with it.

And to add insult to injury, tonight he had the special treat of listening to a couple not too far from him talking about what pro athletes got up to on the road, and just how long it was thought that Holden would tolerate it.

“He'd better hope he's literate enough to understand the prenup when it comes along.”

“Oh,” the older gentleman being spoken to responded. “They’re required to pass basic reading, writing and arithmetic, that much I know.”

And then they had laughed liberally.

Oh, it was priceless. How indeed could a barely educated football player hope to make it with the brilliant son of a mogul, an only child who had graduated with honors in Economics from USC, attained two MBAs from Stanford Business School, and had a string of real estate successes totaling in the hundreds of millions?

He _had_ gone to college, graduated with honors from Wisconsin-Madison while playing Division I college football, and unlike most kids in high school and throughout college, had actually studied for his grades instead of skating by on free passes from the coaches. He had worked hard, just like everyone else he knew, and had managed to go far, never having taken a thing from his parents except self-respect and a loving home. And he had given back to them tenfold.

But none of that mattered to people who had never worked a day in their life. And when it came to gossip, how could the mundanity of the facts compare to the more exciting version of what they had in their heads?

He ought to leave. He didn’t enjoy the bitterness these people and their parties caused in him. But Holden had been correct— these were the same people who were going to fund and see to the success of his foundation, so he was going to have to suck it up and watch.

And so he watched a particularly striking guy sidle up to Holden and begin talking with him. These men did it with such _ease,_ inching closer with every sentence and completely disregarding the blinding rock on Holden’s finger.

He tried looking away, but it was like dragging stone slabs with his bare hands. Neither did he miss the fact that most of the men seemed to be showing up on Cecelia's arm.

With every ounce of his willpower he did drag his eyes away.

He had always had such contempt for men who went around beating their chests like barbarians in jealous rages, growling at anyone who showed any interest in what they considered _their own._

Well not anymore.

~*~

He knew that most of Alastair’s guests were headed back to the Wilson estate for nightcaps, so he made sure that Holden had also left before he got his car from the valet and drove down to Bel Air.

By the time he arrived the guests had already kicked off their shoes and were drunkenly cavorting around the room, calling loudly to each other. He wordlessly entered, standing at the entrance to the living room and searching the room for Holden. He had only been about fifteen minutes behind them so he couldn’t have missed Holden, yet Holden was nowhere inside the room.

Ignoring the calls to have him come join their second round of fun, he was about to turn and stalk back outside to see if Holden’s car was there when a side door opened and Holden was suddenly standing there.

Holden stared at him in surprise and a little apprehension, perhaps at seeing the look on his face as their eyes met.

He crossed the living room and didn’t stop until he had reached the door and had crossed its threshold, propelling Holden backward before him. The room turned out to be a guest bathroom. Good. 

He slammed the door behind him.

~*~

Sounds were slow, deadened around him.

Like echoes from somewhere else, he heard them like sounds of the ocean heard through a seashell. Or, perhaps more appropriate in his case, like being locked up in a soundproofed room.

He felt abysmal, disgusted with himself. He kept his eyes on his plate, not able to look one inch in either direction. 

He was still thrumming with unappeased emotions. Angry, and still embittered, and still suffering from feelings of possessiveness. In less than two hours he would be driving down to San Diego and he knew he was going to have to take it slow. But at least he could do so with the vengeful satisfaction that he had fucked Holden’s lights the night before, and well within hearing range of his friends and family.

He had emerged from the bathroom and headed straight for the front door, and not one of them had said a word to him. Not even his best friend Alastair. 

He hoped they would enjoy spreading the story of how right they had been, how professional athletes were no more than low-class animals pretending to be civilized people. They could even get Holden to give them all the sordid details, whenever Holden had felt comfortable to come out of the bathroom. And they should enjoy the story now, as after all, in a year’s time they didn’t even expect to remember his name.

“Sean!”

He started, looking up. Gia and her two housemates, his vivacious next door neighbors, were smiling wide-eyed at him.

“We're not boring you, are we?” Gia asked in her best offended voice.

He sat up and felt even worse. He was finally having dinner with them—they were so bummed that Holden couldn’t make it—and this was how he was showing his appreciation for their hospitality.

Murmuring an apology, he offered the explanation that he was overloaded of late and was carelessly letting his mind wander. They tossed their hair and scolded him, and got vibrantly back into their conversation, dishing about what was currently wrong with the personal training world.

He smiled at how genuinely sweet, if somewhat kinetic, they were, and took a deep breath. He ought to let thoughts of Holden go for now. He could at least enjoy the ease and freedom of discussing nothing more than the pleasures of a good workout.

~*~

His phone was ringing and he sat there staring at it.

He was on the sofa in his too bright home office, catching up on work. Initially, he’d dimmed the lamps, but then the room had reminded him too much of Sean’s place with its soothing candlelights, and he had gotten back up and turned them up.

Had he dreamt all of that? Their two weeks of perfect harmony?

He didn’t understand why he couldn’t shake this, why there was no straightforward answer for him, when his feelings for Sean were so clear.

His phone was still flashing. It was Kate’s number, and for the life of him he didn’t know whether he wanted to answer it. He didn’t know whether he wanted to hear what she had to tell him.

He reluctantly lifted his hand toward the phone, but at that moment it stopped. He took a breath, contemplating whether he should turn it off completely. But he had been the one to ask her, and she had taken her time to do this.

That Friday past he had taken her to one of his family’s friends cocktail benefits, taking her up on her offer to come into his world and help him see a perspective on his predicament he might be missing.

The party itself, he thought, delaying returning her call, had been a good match for her, though she had been amused by his parents' circle of friends and “their amazingly limited understanding of how the world actually worked.”

“And yet they run it,” she had remarked, laughing with genuine amusement.

She hadn’t minded taking their money though, and had willingly stayed by the side of the member of the House of Representatives to whom he had introduced her and for whom she quickly became the proof of his awareness of the plight of veterans. 

She herself had come prepped, ready with information on veteran causes and hinting at where anyone who was interested might next consider sheltering their money from the IRS. 

And then she had finally seen Sean and had whispered, “Yeow.”

He had been unable to even smile at her comment, feeling what she meant. He had sent Sean an apology bouquet the previous weekend knowing Sean would be back from San Diego, but Sean had barely given him a glance. He knew Sean must have seen it, and he had sent it with a note that he prayed would make Sean understand even a little bit what he was going through, that he wasn’t having an easy time of this. But none of it seemed to have made a difference.

Consequently he had been unable to take his eyes off Sean, staring stupidly and even growing jealous of the women crowding his space and getting gorgeous smiles from him. He had been jealous of women, for goodness sake.

Later, when he had seen Kate off in her car, it had been with a totally distracted mind, and he had barely heard anything she had been saying as she had started up the car and told him she would call him.

And now he was going to hear it.

He picked up the phone, ready to call her, when it buzzed hard in his hand. He tapped the answer button before he could give it any more thought.

“Hello?” he said tentatively into the phone.

“Your father is jealous of you.”

He blinked and lowered the phone. He looked at the screen, wondering whether he had accidentally picked up on someone else's call.

“Hello? Are ya there?”

He brought it back to his ear, pressing it against his face with a shaking hand. “I’m here.”

“I don't know what's going on with you and Sean— that part's hard to figure out. I mean, you're obviously in a fight, but it's not immediately clear who’s entrenched. But your dad? It's way obvious that he wants to see you fail. You said he wasn't very good at relationships, right?”

“Y-yes.” The word simply fell out of his mouth. His thoughts had stopped.

“Right, so he's insinuating himself in a way that's guaranteed to destroy things. I don't know if he's doing it on purpose, but he sure as hell is doing it to make himself feel better.”

“Kate, you're crazy,” he finally exclaimed. “What are you talking about? My dad isn’t jealous of me. Fathers aren’t jealous of their sons' relationships. That’s— weird,” he finished weakly.

She had apparently waited for him to finish talking. She said, “Holden, I have been in a war zone for the past six years. I can tell you from experience that people are capable of anything.”

He held the phone tight, completely failing to respond, or even to breathe.

“You ever noticed the way he looks at Sean?” she asked almost conversationally. “The way he was looking at _you?_ The things he said to you! It was as if he was trying to grab something that kept slipping from his— Oh, you know what it reminded me of? It was like when a kid tells their parent they want to be the first in their family to go to college, and the dad says, what makes you think you're better than us? Get it? Pure envy.”

He couldn't speak. All of him was rejecting her words. Everything she was saying simply had to be wrong.

He had to fight against the tiny, insistent part of him that was whispering _listen to her._

“Holden?” she called, raising her voice. “Did I lose you?”

“N-no, I'm here. I'm here.” 

But he wasn't. His eyes were glued to his feet on the coffee table and his mind was miles away.

“Well, um, I imagine you have a lot to think about,” she said, her voice now gentle. “So I'll say good night?”

“Thank you,” he whispered. Then, “Kate!”

“Yeah?”

He squeezed his eyes shut. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I'm sad to say I'm pretty sure.”

“Okay. Thank you, Kate. I mean it.”

“I know you do, guy. And good luck.”

~*~

And so he sat in his study for a long time after, thinking about Sean.

Thinking about where they had reached.

Whatever else was going on with him, he had to see what it was doing to Sean. 

The elemental thing, that irreducible moment that had attracted him to Sean had been when he had stood before him on that their first meeting and had seen the tenderness in his eyes, his gentleness of soul. It had struck him, in is cynicism, in ways he still struggled to believe in.

It was why what had happened at his father’s house had been, was still, so devastating. That Sean had been that way…the very fact that he had done it.

And he would confess that it had been an experience unlike any other, his body still reacting, his toes still curling after twenty-four hours.

He could still feel how tightly Sean had gripped his shirt, how his knuckles had dug into his stomach as he had whispered, _“You lied to me.”_ He had stuttered _“How?”_ How had he lied to him when he had only ever told him the truth, when he had told him he couldn't even promise him a better version of himself. _“You promised me when you said yes,”_ Sean had said, had barely been able to get it out through his gritted teeth, and that had been all the communication they had achieved.

Steadying himself on the washbasin digging into his back, trying to clutch at Sean's lapel, then at the arm wedged against his chest, then at Sean's collar— had been all he had been capable of doing, while nothing had prepared him for what Sean's fingers had done to him. Or for what being restrained by Sean while he had felt as though his mind was snapping had done to his body. Or to where his mind had finally gone when Sean had finally unbuckled his trousers, promising him he would never forget this. 

The thought that there had been an audience outside the door, the first thing he saw when he opened the door, had been the very last thing he could have processed.

But no matter what it had awakened in him, it was something that he never wanted to put Sean through again. He knew better than to think that anger like that was congruent with Sean’s being.

And it was why, twenty-four hours later, he was still ashamed, and still processing the hurt that Sean had so very clearly communicated to him.

~*~


	10. Chapter 10

It was Friday, just after ten p.m. on the twenty-fourth of July, and he was sitting by himself inside Spago in Beverly Hills.

Outside, a clear half-moon shone brightly. Inside, nearly all the lights had been turned off. The restaurant staff was quietly closing down for the night.

For the past five days he had been down in San Diego training and coaching at the Youth Camp. Whenever he came back up here, though, it was as though everything he was helping teach those kids—strategizing, improvising, taking hits, and generally enduring the hardships of team sports with the hopes that those were lessons they could take through life—mocked him.

He wasn't strategizing, or improvising, but he sure was taking hits.

Tonight he had tried letting it all slide off his back, tried to grow a thick skin. At the party which he had just left he had even gone and tried to talk to Beau, Alastair's current wife, and all she had done was stare vacantly at him, not even acknowledging his words. She was thirty-three, stunning and married to a real estate billionaire. She didn't have to say a word to him if she didn't feel like it. He had moved away.

After that he had spoken to only one other person, the man whose conversation had finally driven him from the party. And he had only been there an hour. He had simply been too beat to try, knowing when he was defeated. He had waved good night to Alastair, who had been staring at him all night and so hard that he had begun wondering what he had missed while in San Diego, and had exited the ballroom.

Fifteen minutes later, from the Hilton to North Cañon Drive, he had entered the restaurant in a bit of a fog, thinking that once he was alone he would feel better. But it seemed that the ghosts from the fundraiser had come with him to the empty restaurant. Wolfgang, the owner and one of the biggest cheerleaders off the field, wasn't around, but the executive chef had offered him a drink which he had accepted. His second of the night.

And to think that once upon a time getting him to have one drink at a Chargers party used to be cause to start a betting pool among his teammates.

He trailed a finger along the condensation of the glass tumbler.

What he had actually done was leave the party before Holden could arrive and he went and did something to further humiliate himself. 

He hadn't seen Holden in a week. Ever since— ever since he had been upset at him in the bathroom. 

What the hell had he thought he was _doing_ in there? 

His heart ached without wanting to stop for a break. He missed his lover, his best friend, his beautiful sweetheart full of flaws. He would take every last one of those flaws now, because most of all he missed waking up next to the man who could so effortlessly look into his eyes and become a part of him.

He took a sip of his Bacardi and diet Coke, and the finally permitted himself to think about the person whose conversation had finally driven him from the party.

He never got the guy's name—hadn't wanted it—but the guy was perhaps a few years younger than him. The man had wandered through the crowd to come stand next to him and initially he had ignored him, thinking it was someone come to make the usual snarky cocktail remarks. But the guy had started smalltalking with no apparent agenda and he had been forced to reply, wondering what his game was.

Then his talker had leaned in, lowered his voice and said, “I used to date Holden, by the way.”

It had taken quite an effort to control his disgust. Or so he had thought. The guy had held up his hand and had told him he hadn't come to pick a fight.

“Just saw the look on your face and I thought it reminded me of myself six years ago.”

He wondered what look the man was referring to, and he'd listened with an unsure mind as the man had gone on to tell him that none of the Bel Air people had expected him to last either, and in fact he hadn’t. But after he and Holden separated he had suddenly gotten every opportunity he had ever dreamed of. Courtesy of Alastair Wilson.

“I'm talkin' everything. I got it all. Just because I dated his son.” The man had paused and looked around the room. “The altruism of the rich.”

He had refused to give any kind of a reaction.

He finished his drink, tipped his chair backward to see if he could catch one of the kitchen staff’s eye through the colored glass wall. A waiter saw him and nodded as he held up the empty glass. He sat forward again. 

And at that moment Holden walked into the restaurant.

He dropped his eyes to the table, cursing himself as his heart started fluttering in his chest like a caged bird.

Holden came and sat down across from him at the small table. 

He wanted to get up and walk away rather than sit here and fight reaching across the table. He thought helplessly of the last time they had sat like this after a separation, and wished he could be as calm as then, as unruffled. 

He ventured a look up and saw Holden’s face.

He put down his drink.

Holden was red-eyed, his face flushed, his eyes irritated as though he had been…crying. His lashes were spiked and wet and his blue eyes, when he looked up, were brimming with shame.

He sat forward across the table. “What happened?”

It took some moments for Holden to speak, but when he did he said, “You don't have to come to any of these functions anymore.”

Holden's voice was scratched up, broken. 

He felt adrenaline shoot through him just as though he had been tackled on the field.

“Holden,” he said loudly. _“What happened?”_

“I got into a fight with my father.”

He turned around and snatched up his jacket.

“Don’t, don’t, don’t,” Holden whispered, his eyes filling up, and then spilling over with tears.

He stared, astounded. Then he stood up and took Holden's arm, gently making him stand up as well. Holden did so, and he carefully took him out back and out into the garden patio. 

He moved them to one side and took Holden by both shoulders. “I need you to tell me what happened,” he said, again much too loudly. But he was shaking, feeling his mind taking off in several directions at once, trying to see which play was going to end him exactly where he wanted.

“He— he—” But Holden was too distraught to say whatever was on his mind. “He’s a fucking _asshole._ ”

He held him. Holden sobbed, burying his face against his throat and crying as though his heart had been ripped out and ground to pulp. All he would repeat was that his father was an asshole, and _“all this time I thought it was me.”_

He kissed him, and rubbed his back, and held him so close they were sharing the same breath, while Holden clutched his shirt. 

But his heart was pounding against his ribcage, and he felt as though he had been blinded. He saw nothing but rage.

He pulled back and told Holden to wait there. Then he hurried back into the hallway, toward the kitchen. Leaning into the entrance, he asked whether any of them could lend him their car for the evening.

Struggling to keep his voice even he said, “I left mine at the Hilton but I'll get it back to you by morning.”

There was a moment of confusion as the staff looked at each other. Then the chef nodded at one of the waiters who then ran out to get a key from the valet. He waited, eyes glazed over, taking the key with a curt thanks when the waiter returned.

Holden was rubbing the heel of his hand into his forehead when he returned to the garden, and slowly walked with him when he touched his arm.

He drove them back to Holden’s condo in perfect silence. It was five minutes on the empty road. 

He pulled up to the semicircular driveway of the Wilshire, lowered his voice and told the valet, who nodded, that he would need the car in a few, and went around to the other side. He opened the door for Holden and walked him into the lobby, standing between him and the rest of the world while Holden keyed in his code and called for his elevator.

He got Holden inside the elevator and stood behind him with his arm around his waist, got him up and into to his place, and walked him to his bedroom. He removed Holden's jacket, tie and shoes and made him lie down, then got into bed with him when Holden started crying again, and held him, willing his heart to slow down.

In about ten minutes Holden fell asleep. He knew because he had been checking his watch.

As soon as Holden was out he slid his arm from under him and got off the bed. He stood there staring down at him, making sure Holden was indeed out for the count.

Then he turned and left the room.

~*~

Alastair was still at the party when he arrived.

He saw Cecelia first and asked her where her husband was. Those were the exact words he said to her, “Where's your husband,” forgetting that they were divorced.

She wordlessly pointed a finger to an adjoining room to the ballroom and he went in, looking around. It was a club room of sorts, and Alastair was standing by the windows with his back to him.

He walked over and tapped his shoulder. “Al, can I talk to you for a second?”

Alastair looked over his shoulder, then casually turned around. There were a number of guests standing around them. He began to move aside for some privacy, but Alastair vigorously shook his head.

“Say it, Sean,” he said briskly.

He glanced at their audience. “Here?” he asked carefully.

“Yes, here! You're coming to defend that disrespectful boy? Say it!”

He narrowed his eyes, watching Alastair's anger taking over his entire carriage. The man was, without a doubt, livid. But, and this was something he got paid a lot of money to see, he could also see a defensiveness about him, like when Holden knew he had done something wrong and was trying to cover himself.

He had been so dumb. All this time he had thought Holden was relishing playing this game with his parents, taking a willing part in some kind of rich people's entertainment. But that was not the case at all.

Holden had been a prisoner of this world all along, buying into their talk because most sons would go to any length to please their fathers. Because of all the people in the world a son could stand to see wrong, it was never his father. 

“All right,” he said slowly, choosing his words. “I’ve known you for a relatively short time, Al, but I think you should know you’ve abused your relationship with your son. Badly.”

“How dare you!” Alastair barked. “Holden's the one who's lost his mind! He said the most _awful_ things to me. No son has the right to talk to his father like that!”

“But every son has the right to question his father,” he responded, surprised by how calm he was. “Can you understand that? I think you need to ask yourself a very important question where the love of your son is concerned.” 

And before he could say anything further, Darren Moran was standing next to him.

Moran had appeared suddenly, closing the gap between him and Alastair, and was waving his hand.

“Sean,” Moran said casually, as if he butted into private conversations every day. “Please watch your tone when speaking to Mr. Wilson. This isn't a locker room, you know.”

And then he smirked.

He stared at the man in disbelief. “Who the _fuck_ are you?”

And Darren Moran proceeded to say the most incredibly offensive thing he believed he had ever heard one man say to another, while standing right in front of his face.

And that was how the party ended.

~*~


	11. Chapter 11

He arrived at the hospital way after everyone else.

He’d woken up fifteen minutes before to find Sean gone and no messages on his phone. Feeling panicked knowing that Sean had gone to confront his father, he had rushed back to the Beverly Hilton to see, to his deepest shock, cop cars everywhere, flashing strobe lights bouncing off everything.

His parents were likewise nowhere to be found, until finally one of their family friends told him what had happened, and that Sean and Darren Moran had been taken to Cedars Sinai.

He didn't remember driving to the hospital, as he was just suddenly standing in front of the nurse's station trying to keep his panic in check, while trying to get information as fast as he could.

The charge nurse finally stood up, touching his arm, and got through to him that Sean had been released a little under an hour ago. 

“The doctors had kept him to check that he didn't have a concussion, but after that he had been free to go.”

He kept staring at her, trying to make his mind work to accept what she was saying. “Is he— is he all right?”

“He's fine, he was discharged forty-five minutes ago. A little bruising but that's about it.”

He looked to his right suddenly, sensing movement, and saw his father coming toward him. Following close behind him were his mother, Leona, another friend of theirs, and Nicola Moran, Darren’s mother.

“You wonder how they can tell a new concussion from the ones he’s obviously sustained playing football,” his father said, and came and stood much too close to him. “Holden—”

He faced his father. He could actually feel the heat flaming off his face, he was so livid. He thanked the nurse and moved toward his father. His father stood there staring at him with a frosty look on his face. 

No matter.

He took him by the arm and pulled, walking him back down the hall to a secluded spot. When they were far away enough from the others, he turned around and looked at his father. Alastair's eyes, carbon copies of his, stared straight into him. 

Despite his boiling anger, he wasn’t muddled or at a loss for words. He was, strangely, at ease.

His father waited for him to speak, which was good. He was mostly likely waiting for an apology, which was bad.

“I'm not going to do this anymore,” he told his father, his busted voice making it sound lighthearted. “I don't like it.”

His father frowned. His eyes flew over all his face, then past his shoulder to where his mother stood, probably breathless to know what they were saying.

“I'm sure you'll be telling her all about it as soon as we're done,” he said, touching his father’s arm. “So I'd listen very carefully if I were you.”

That got him his attention.

He shrugged. “Who's to say whether your way of living is right or wrong. Because I’ll be honest, I don’t see anyone out there any more or less happier than our friends or family.”

Alastair straightened, as if his point had just been validated, and he raised his hand, shaking his head.

“I’m not through. But I do know one thing, however. Your way of life does not make Sean happy. And when Sean's not happy, I'm not happy.” He paused, looking at his father’s face, making sure he was listening. “So here's the deal. You and mom, and everyone else, are going to leave me and Sean out of your games. Otherwise I promise you you'll both be leaving me voicemail for the rest of your lives.”

Alastair was looking at him. He didn't believe he had ever seen his father so serious.

Well, he was glad someone in his family was finally listening. Even as he felt the imperative to do this, it wasn't easy. 

Ever since Kate's call he had been walking around like glass waiting to shatter. Even if, as Kate had so correctly called it, his father had failed at relationships, why wouldn’t he allow his son to succeed? Why was he only permitted to succeed at business?

He had tried to bring this up to his father and instead his father had said such horrible things to him that he was ashamed to admit the words had made him cry.

So no, this wasn't easy. But wow, did it feel good.

He leaned closer. “Dad, do you understand what I'm saying?”

His father pressed his lips tightly and nodded.

“All right,” he said, stepping back. Without looking back to see what his mother was doing, he went in the opposite direction down the hall.

He came to a stop at the room the nurse had told him was Darren’s. Stepping aside to let by the exiting doctor, who greeted him and told him that Darren could now see visitors, he went inside.

~*~

“What do you have?” he asked Darren flatly.

Darren, dressed in a hospital gown and covered to his waist his blankets, had his face turned away. He stood by his bed, staring down at him.

Darren's arm was bruised all the way up and on the backs of his hands, and his left wrist was bandaged. His neck showed bruising where Sean had gripped him by the throat after Darren had hit him in the face. The entire left side of his face looked like it had fallen under a truck.

“A sprain and some contusions," Darren said hoarsely. "The doctor said it's not serious.”

Darren’s voice sounded tight and strained, but he didn’t think it was from his physical injuries. He knew the sound of a bruised ego when he heard it.

He was surprised at how quickly you could go from standing on your feet mouthing off at someone you didn't know to lying bashed up in a private bed at Cedars.

“That’s too bad,” he said about the lack of seriousness of the injuries.

Darren turned and looked at him. “I’ll get him for this.”

He made a face. “Darren, fuck off.” He could barely believe this guy. “We dated in B-school, well over ten years ago. I didn't even remember you existed until my mother started shoving you into my face a few weeks ago. So stop acting like we're in an episode of _Melrose Place._ This ends here. Got it?”

Darren stared at him with infuriated eyes. He held then, before turning for the door without waiting for a reply.

“Holden, honestly, what are you _doing_ with that guy?”

He got to the door before remembering one more thing and turned around. “Oh, and by the way. Dare press a single charge against him, and I swear to God I'll have you killed.”

Darren stared at him and he stared back. Darren was probably wondering just how far he would go if he fucked with Sean's career. When it seemed that Darren was convinced, Darren lowered his eyes and nodded. 

He opened the door and left the room. 

And finally, he went home.

~*~


	12. Chapter 12

Sean was sitting up in bed in his dimly lit room, a bowl of water, washcloth-wrapped icepacks and his bruised left eye keeping him company. 

His eye was swollen almost shut as well.

He sat on the bed and slowly took the cold compress from him. 

“I would have been fine with an I love you, you know,” he said softly, holding the washcloth to Sean's face. “You didn't have to go beat up a guy.”

“Let's just be thankful it wasn't Alastair.”

He managed to smile.

Sean lowered his head, giving him a faltering look. “I was going to text you but didn't in case your phone's buzzing woke you. I figured you'd hear about it soon enough anyway.”

“You shouldn't have done it, Sean,” he said seriously. “You jeopardized your pristine reputation in the NFL.”

“Who cares about the fucking league,” Sean said darkly. “That dick had the guts to say those things to my face.”

“What did he say?” he asked, intrigued. Nobody seemed to want to repeat it.

“Doesn't matter what he said. Now he knows just how bad they taste going back down, though. Ow, ow,” Sean gasped, touching the cold cloth he was gently pressing to his swollen, purple flesh.

His heart did all kinds of flip flops. His darling Sean. His hero.

“God,” Sean said softly. “Of all things I expected to happen, all the people I've been preparing myself to face— crazy football fans, anything—”

His hand was freezing from the icepack. He turned to look at the bowl and Sean nodded at it.

“The water's warm.”

He put his hand in it for a few seconds until it was warm again, then took up the compress once more and pressed it gently to Sean's eye.

“How long is it supposed to stay on?” he asked softly.

“Thirty minutes should help with the swelling.”

He nodded, slowly, closely watching Sean. There was an air of sadness about him, his head bowed, his eyes searching when he looked at him. It was as if he didn't know what to except from this moment, and it made his heart swell so much he could barely stand it.

“I told my dad to take a hike,” he rasped.

Sean looked at him. “Seriously?”

He nodded. There was silence for a few moments.

“Think it'll change anything?” Sean asked.

“Probably not.”

Sean lowered his head again, nodding, and seeming to find something very interesting about his grey bedcovers.

There was so much he wanted to say to this man who had stuck by him through thick and thin. 

He thought about the day Sean had proposed to him, how he had felt, as if the earth was shifting under his feet, when Sean had returned from the movies, had bravely got down on one knee and had once again offered him his ring.

Even though he had been thoroughly amused, he had looked with a perfectly serious heart at this man who would go to such lengths for him. He had asked Sean to please get up and had stood very still as Sean, with a very steady hand, had slipped the ring on his finger.

But he looked at Sean now and saw a man still on his knees. It was easy to say, “Please get up,” but he knew now he had to give him a reason why. 

So he told Sean a story.

“Do you remember that afternoon we had lunch with my dad, what he said about he and I making a bet?”

“About you being married before your fortieth birthday?”

He nodded. “That wasn't the actual bet, however.” He took a deep breath and started. “When I was— I think I'd just turned twenty-two, I'd broken up—if you could call it that, as it turned out I thought we were going out and he was under a different impression… But the point is, when we broke up I was pretty torn up and vowed to never get married or be with anyone for the longterm. I mean, I was a kid, but it didn't feel any less painful. Well, to try and console me, my dad bet me that not only would I get over this guy and many more like him to come, I'd be married and divorced twice before I turned forty.”

He stared at the cloth in his hands.

“It was like being cursed,” he said softly. “I felt such shock. But I didn't even know to be angry at him.”

Sean rubbed his arm, but didn’t say a word. Sean was listening very carefully.

“My mom spent my teenage years, my early teens, pretending she didn’t notice a thing about my dad’s affairs. Soon, I guess, he decided a man in his position was entitled to mistresses in the real sense of the word and stopped hiding them from her. He would bring them to the house. A new addition to the family, he would tell her. Remember what she said about you at the pool?”

Sean nodded. 

“Well, he expected her to respect his wishes and treat each new one like a new friend of hers. And she didn’t divorce him.”

He paused, giving his voice a rest and using the opportunity to collect his thoughts. He didn’t want to leave anything out as this was a journey through himself he wanted to make only once.

“My mother's life had turned to crap but she just kept on. Drinking and making polite conversation with these women. Can you believe it? She would remember their birthdays and everything. I guess she and Leona, and really most of their friends, decided they would handle it like a buddy system. They would all link arms and survive it together. But, as was bound to happen, my dad suddenly decided he could go all out with this new _rule of seven_ he got from god knows where. Though, in his case, I was fifteen before they finally divorced. But suddenly it was like a rash of divorces through the community, with all these women refusing to give their husbands the satisfaction of watching them fall apart. And then they simply became part of the system just as completely, going through husbands and having affairs and perfecting the art of the prenup. Generally managing the whole sorry mess as cold-heartedly as they could, I suppose.”

He stopped, sighing, and thought about it for a moment.

“Honestly, I can’t say I grew up unhappy. It’s more like, after a while I just…took it all for normal. Still, I remember feeling embarrassed when my dad would start talking at the dinner table about how in the old days in Japan, lords were able to order specialized geishas for whatever phases of their lives they were going through. And there would be his latest mistress sitting right there. He would say to me, always look for the finest qualities in a sexual partner, Holden, whether they be male or female. I guess the women didn’t mind, he always set them up with healthy financial portfolios before sending them on their way.”

He stopped talking and looked tiredly at the washcloth he was holding.

“That's all,” he finally said.

Sean reached for him, pulling at him, making him sit up, and still pulling until he got the idea and straddled him. He shifted closer, wrapping his arms around Sean’s neck and making sure the cooling washcloth stayed from his back.

Sean pulled him even closer, until there was no room between them and he was breathing on his mouth. He breathed him in, watching Sean place a hand on his chest over where his heart beat steadily.

“Why aren't you like either of them?” Sean asked, his blue eyes so serious.

He smiled and lowered his head. Sean said it and it was perfectly easy. 

It was the question he hadn’t been able to answer for himself the night of his mother’s cocktail party. The question that had brought them to this place. 

He hadn’t been able to answer it because he had been asking the wrong question. He had _never_ been like them in the first place, which was why he hadn’t felt any different upon committing to Sean. 

He had always believed in all the things that they had told him were imaginary. True love, forever and a day.

“I've been told I'm a lot like my great-grandfather,” he said.

Sean frowned deeply. “You're telling me it skips _two_ generations? That doesn't bode well for our children.”

A very intense, satisfied feeling tugged deep inside him, and a smile pulled across his face. “I’m not even going to touch that.”

Sean was looking at him, and it was making him feel like he was drowning in eyes full of promises. He leaned to the side and placed the washcloth on the nightstand. Then he straightened and slipped his hands into Sean's hair.

“Would you like some sugar?” he asked softly.

“Like you wouldn't believe.”

* * *

  _Epilogue_

He worked the room from on end to the other, concentrating on the people he knew would, three months from now, be pushing for a seat on the board of Sean's foundation.

People had indeed noticed, all these past weeks, Sean's unwavering dedication to charity causes, and now that the time had come for him to have his own foundation's inaugural dinner, they had come from out of the woodwork to fund it.

Trailing the room, he felt a wonderful feeling of accomplishment, of success.

Across the room Sean stood in the midst of a gaggle of his father's golfing buddies, listening to their usual guy talk, his father once again at Sean's side as if they had always been best friends forever.

The room was filled to capacity, the organizers having done a stellar job of decorating. The words _The Jackson Foundation for LGBT Youth_ gleamed in huge silver letters against one wall. He couldn't have been more satisfied.

He was smiling at group after group of glittering guests, and it was why it took him sometime to notice that Sean was watching him around the head of one guest.

He smiled at Sean but Sean kept staring at him, the thoughts in his eyes more obvious than the conversations going on around them. After a moment Sean crooked his finger at him.

He felt his smile widening as he let his feet take him over. Sean excused himself, meeting him outside of the circle of golfers and right in the middle of the room, with no protest whatsoever from him putting his arms fully around him.

Maybe none of these people had changed, but they certainly had.

They had just withstood the first real test to their commitment and had survived it. For the first time in his adult life, he was ready to flaunt a relationship.

He wrapped his arm around Sean's neck and kissed him on the corner of his mouth.

“Mmm,” Sean moaned softly, lowering his head to rub his forehead against his temple. “I like this Holden Wilson.”

“And I love this Sean Jackson.” 

He couldn't stop smiling, closing his eyes as Sean kissed his temple, his beard ticking the side of his face.

Then Sean tightened his arms around him, bending him over every so slightly, and said, “Kiss me, baby, your parents are watching.”

He laughed, and did.

~*~  
 _Part 4: Right When It's Right - Part I_


End file.
